Andromache
by Ailsa
Summary: After the Trojan War, Andromache, the wife of Hector, becomes the concubine of the Neoptolemus. Based on the myths.
1. Tenedos

**Andromache**

* * *

She awoke on the floor of the ship and heard the waves of water hit from all sides. There were roughly fifty men on the ship, and many of them were discussing the events that unfolded during the fall of Troy.

"Only the weakest of men would take back an unfaithful wife who has humiliated him to all of Hellas. Had I been King Menelaus, I would have plunged a sword straight through that Spartan whore's heart."

"It was the will of the gods that she should live."

"No doubt. But it's a shame, isn't it? That we watched Neoptolemus plunge his sword into that innocent child while the whore of Sparta gets to live? And this one…"

She didn't look, but knew he was gesturing to her.

"…no doubt Hector's wife will kill herself the first chance she gets. No woman would want to be the slave of her child's killer."

"That's why Neoptolemus said we have to keep her bound tightly. Until we reach Tenedos."

She opened her eyes. Her wrists and ankles were bound tightly by rope, and those ropes were tied to the mast of the ship. It was to keep her from jumping overboard.

The sun baked her skin.

She wasn't the only one tied to the mast of the ship. Helenus, too, was bound—he was Hector's sole surviving brother, a seer captured on Mount Ida as they neared the tenth year of the war. His prophecies had helped the Achaeans take the city.

"Andromache," Helenus said. He noticed she had woken.

She refused to speak to him. She hadn't spoken to anyone at all since they threw her baby from the walls of the city. That was two days ago.

"It's not over," Helenus said. "I've seen the future, and it is not over."

* * *

She was sixteen when she married Hector. Hector was thirty-two. The age difference was nothing out of the ordinary.

She remembered the warm welcome she had received from the royal Trojan family when she first arrived at the city. Ten of Hector's younger brothers and sisters greeted the newlyweds at the Scaean Gates. Paris was not there—he had sailed for Hellas, to bargain with the Achaeans for the return of his aunt Hesione.

A little girl with brown ringlets tumbled into Hector's arms—it was his youngest sister, Polyxena, then only five years old.

"Our Hector's finally married," the princess Laodice said with a laugh, stretching her arms out and welcoming Andromache with a sisterly embrace.

Hector's younger brothers and sisters introduced themselves to Andromache: the crafty Deiphobus, then twenty-two, the twin prophets Cassandra and Helenus who were both sixteen (it would be two more months before Cassandra went mad), the lovely princess Creusa who had not yet wed Aeneas, and many boys who would come of age during the war and die before the city fell.

* * *

When the ship reached the island of Tenedos, someone untied the ropes that bound Andromache to the mast and helped her up to a standing position. Another gave her clean drinking water.

Two men boarded the ship—one very young with red-gold curls, one very old with almost no hair at all. The young one was Neoptolemus, son of Achilles. He was the one who received Andromache as a prize of war.

The very sight of Neoptolemus caused a wave of revulsion to run through her. She closed her eyes for a brief moment so she wouldn't have to look at him. Thankfully, Neoptolemus ignored her and turned to Helenus.

"Have your visions told you where we are headed, Seer?" Neoptolemus asked.

"Epirus," answered Helenus. "The same direction as King Odysseus."

Andromache lowered her head so that she could avoid notice.

"Yes," confirmed Neoptolemus, "but my grandmother tells me that Poseidon is eager to stir the seas against those sailing west. We will sail north instead to Thrace, and from Thrace we will journey on foot."

Even though Andromache kept her head lowered, she could tell Neoptolemus had turned his attention to her.

He walked up to her and she shrank back instinctively. Though he stood right in front of her, she kept her eyes focused intently on the mast of the ship. He reached his hand out and touched his thumb to her cheek, moving it along her cheekbone. The touch made her feel sick inside. Helenus stayed silent.

Neoptolemus drew his hand away. "We will stay on Tenedos for two more days so the storms may pass. We will need tents, and a fire."

Helenus bowed his head. "Yes Master." The additional months in captivity had accustomed him to his position as a slave.

* * *

Unlike most of the Achaean leaders, Neoptolemus had few slave girls of his own. The female slaves of his father—spoils of war from the cities of Thebe, Antandrus, and Lyrnessus—had been distributed among the other Achaean leaders when Achilles died.

Apart from Andromache, the only female travelers were three palace servants who had been taken captive as well. The three servants were good friends with one another and loved to sing. Their names were Strophe, Antistrophe, and Epode.

After a man led Andromache into a large tent, the three songbirds stripped off her robes and helped her bathe. They washed the dirt and tearstains from her face and rubbed scented oils onto her skin to heal the damage done by the salty spray of the sea.

"Our poor mistress," said Strophe sadly. "Once set to be the next queen of Troy, now slave to the son of her husband's slayer."

"She is not the first royal to become a slave," said Antistrophe. "I hear old Aethra was mother to the famous Theseus."

"Perhaps with time she will come to love her captor," said Strophe. "Briseis of Lyrnessus did."

"Briseis of Lyrnessus did not lose a child," said Antistrophe.

Fresh tears rolled down Andromache's cheeks.

"I want to die," she whispered. "Yet I am too much of a coward to do it myself."

Epode smiled sadly at her and wiped away her mistress's tears with a napkin. "It's because you still hold onto hope."

Andromache wished she didn't.

Once they had bathed her and dressed her in long golden robes that trailed to the floor, taken from her own store-room, they decked her in jewels and wrapped a jeweled band around her hair. And then they departed, leaving her alone as a small fire crackled in the bronze brazier at the tent's center, illuminating the tent in a reddish-orange glow. A pile of goatskin hides formed a bed in the corner.

She looked around the tent. A table in the corner supported two gold chalices and a tall bronze amphora filled with wine. A dull ache resonated within her when she recognized the chalices. They were the spoils of Cilician Thebe, taken in the eighth year of the war when Achilles sacked the city and killed her father and brothers.

She looked down at her robes and fingered the dark gold embroidery. She had stitched it herself—whirling flower patterns ran along the hem.

And there she waited in dread, knowing who the next person to come into the tent would be. She was glad Hector couldn't see her now.

Footsteps sounded outside the tent, and soon Neoptolemus appeared from behind a flap. His face contained a look of apathy. He was well-dressed, having returned from a sacrifice to Pallas Athena.

His presence caused her to look down.

"Pour me a cup of wine," he ordered.

It was her first task as a slave. She lifted the bronze amphora on the table and slowly tilted the dark liquid into a gold chalice. Neoptolemus watched her apathetically.

"How old are you?" he asked her calmly.

She kept her eyes down. "Twenty-seven," she murmured quietly.

"So you're the same age as Helenus. I'm seventeen."

Andromache rested the amphora back on the table.

Neoptolemus drank deeply from the chalice. When he set it back on the table, His eyes lingered for a moment on her robes. "I've always admired the long embroidered robes worn by Anatolian women. There is a modesty to it that you don't find in women from Hellas."

She knew he expected her to say something, so she quietly said, "I embroidered it myself."

He tilted his head slightly, mildly intrigued. "Did you really? If that's the case, you must take care not to let it crinkle. Perhaps it is best to take it off."

The words took a moment to set in. Andromache continued to stand their numbly, keeping her face impassive.

"Did you hear me?" Neoptolemus asked softly. "I said take it off."

She undid the pins at her shoulders slowly, keeping her eyes on a knot on the wooden table so she would not have to look up. She felt the fabric of her robes fall away, baring her naked body. She willed her mind away from it.

She heard his breath sharpen as he looked at her.

"Stand over there," he said, "so I may have a better look at you."

She had not seen where he had pointed. "Where?"

"Over there." He gestured to the brazier at the center of the tent.

The robes had fallen around her feet. She stepped out of them, fighting the urge to hide her body with her hands because the gesture would have made her look as humiliated as she felt. She stood by the brazier, completely exposed in front of the young man who had thrown her small boy off the walls of Troy, whose father had killed her own father, and her brothers, and her husband.

Neoptolemus studied her under the light of the brazier. "So this is what Hector sees."

It was too much. Tears fell down her cheeks again. Neoptolemus didn't seem to care. He slouched in his seat and put one hand under his tunic, stroking himself slowly.

"Do you know why I requested you as my prize?" he asked softly, his eyes moving from her breasts to the dark mass between her legs.

She decided not to answer at all, and kept her eyes on the wooden table so she would not have to look at him.

He continued, "In the Achaean fortifications, the warriors would often speak of the beautiful girls on the opposite side of the wall. They would talk endlessly about Laodice's fair skin, Cassandra's big dark eyes, and Polyxena with her glossy curls. Though the men never spoke about you the same way they spoke about your _kunyadhas_ , you were revered all the same. Everyone saw you as the ideal wife—faithful, sweet-tempered, a far cry from the treacherous Helen. It was a shame that the ideal woman belonged to Troy—the city that robbed me of a father. That is why I decided you would belong to me."

He rose from his seat, still stroking himself under the hem of his tunic.

"Go to the bed" he ordered, "on your hands and knees."

She numbly obeyed. He came over to her and climbed behind her, putting one hot sweaty hand on each of her hips. She could hear his ragged breath over one of her shoulders.

Hector would have killed him.

Neoptolemus was clumsy-he knew little as to what he was doing and thrusted from the wrong angle. The movement stabbed at the sensitive folds of her skin and she braced herself from crying out in pain. He gripped her hips harder, uttering words of pleasure under his breath as he found his way inside of her and then began thrusting very quickly, skin slapping against skin. The goatskin hides shifted under the repetitive motions. Behind her, Neoptolemus had worked up a sweat. She could feel it smear itself against the skin on her back, and behind her thighs.

It was the most humiliating experience of her life.

At last he released her, exhaling loudly and falling onto his back. He touched her cheek in almost a caress and she recoiled at it.

"May I go now," she said quietly.

He gave a lazy wave of his hand.

"Go," he grunted as he lay on his back to catch his breath.

She stood up, and she felt a thick glob of his seed ooze out of her. She wiped it away with her hand, and then wiped her hand on a napkin. She dressed and felt the sweat he had left on her body contaminate her gold robes. The sharp smell of his body lingered on her.

She stumbled out of the tent, past Neoptolemus's guards, and fell to her knees, retching into the dirt. And then she put her hands to her face and began crying so hard she felt her whole body shake. The guards of Neoptolemus stood silent in the darkness like statues, unmoved by the tears of the young woman who once thought to be the next queen of Troy.

Only the trees seemed to join Andromache in her mourning. Their branches bent softly in the wind, spirits of the hamadryads rustling their whispers of sorrow.

* * *

 **A/N:** Story of Andromache's life after the war comes from three sources: Euripides' play Andromache, Apollodorus' Epitome, and a short scene in the Aeneid.


	2. To Thrace

To Thrace

* * *

"It's going to land right there," Cassandra whispered as she pointed at a stone bench in the courtyard.

The blue-and-yellow kingfisher landed at the exact spot Cassandra said it would. Andromache laughed in delight. The seers from her native Thebe had always been ambiguous in their prophecies. None had Cassandra's clarity.

The two Trojan princesses—one by birth, one by marriage—had become fast friends since Andromache's arrival in the city. They held a mutual admiration for one another: Cassandra admired Andromache's quiet stoicism, and Andromache admired Cassandra's boldness.

The kingfisher fluttered its wings and sped off, and the two girls made their way to the stone bench. Andromache brushed away the tiny white flowers that had fallen from the ash tree that hung over the bench.

"They should move the bench a little further away from the tree," Andromache said.

Cassandra looked up at the tree, which had been planted only a few years before. "My father wanted it like this, so that the flowers could fall on him while he sat. They remind him of his sister—the flowering ash was her favorite tree."

Andromache did not know King Priam had a sister. "Did she die?"

"She was captured as a war prize when Heracles killed my grandfather Laomedon," Cassandra answered.

Cassandra scooped up several of the flowers and blew on them, letting them scatter around her feet. Everything about the sight was beautiful—Cassandra was beautiful, the flowers were beautiful, and so was the palace courtyard itself.

"Your visions told you all of this?" Andromache asked in wonder.

Cassandra smiled. "All this and more."

* * *

The fifty ships of Neoptolemus left Tenedos in separate directions. Forty-nine of the ships sailed for Phthia, home to the Myrmidons. The final ship, which allowed for only twenty oars, carried Neoptolemus, Helenus, Andromache, the three palace servants, an old man whom Neoptolemus sought advice from, and twenty men who had sailed with Neoptolemus from his native Scyros.

Andromache and Helenus were once again tied to the mast of the ship. Neoptolemus and the old man were talking at the front of the ship.

Andromache turned to Helenus. Quietly, she said, "Cassandra's prophecies came true. Troy did burn."

Helenus looked grim. "Her visions were always clearer than mine."

"And yet we didn't believe her. We thought she went mad."

"She _did_ go mad," Helenus said. "Perhaps from visions of the horrors."

They silenced when Neoptolemus walked towards them.

Neoptolemus told ordered two men at the oars to untie Helenus from the mast. Once Helenus was untied, Neoptolemus spoke.

"Your prophecies have been of immense help to us, Seer," he said, "and for that I will grant you your freedom once we arrive in Epirus."

Andromache could see it was a bribe—by offering to free Helenus after a safe voyage, Neoptolemus was ensuring his own safety with the seer's help.

Helenus kept his head down, "Thank you Master."

As Helenus advised Neoptolemus on which routes to take, the palace maid Strophe knelt at Andromache's side and offered her some water from a wineskin.

"Is there anything else you need, Mistress?" the young woman whispered gently. She had to whisper, because even addressing Andromache as _Mistress_ was a defiance of their new master.

There was.

"I need to be untied," Andromache answered in the most regal voice she could manager, "so that I may relieve myself."

It had been hours since they had left Tenedos.

"I've been asked not to unbind you from the mast," Strophe said meekly.

Andromache felt her face burn. "Do they expect me to lie in my own waste?"

Strophe disappeared for a moment and returned with an empty amphora, looking apologetic. "The old man says this will have to do. I wish I could do more."

Andromache looked around at the rows of men at the oars. They paid her no attention.

Strophe arranged her skirt around the amphora, and Andromache squatted over it and relieved herself in the middle of the ship where everyone could see her. She felt as if all the human qualities had been taken from her, and she was little more than an animal ready for slaughter.

* * *

"All this and more," Cassandra had said.

Andromache had a request for her husband's sister. "Will you tell me my future?"

Cassandra closed her eyes. Her brows knitted together in concentration. Andromache waited nervously, picking up a few of the tiny white flowers scattered around her feet absentmindedly.

After a while, Cassandra abandoned the effort. "I can't see anything."

"Surely you must see something," Andromache pressed.

Cassandra shook her head. "I can't. It's as if a cloud is shrouding my vision."

"At least tell me if I will have sons," Andromache pleaded. Bearing sons was perceived to be a wife's main duty, and Andromache was afraid she would shame her new husband's family by being barren.

Cassandra closed her eyes again. After a moment, she said, "That's easy. You hold the answer in the palm of your hand."

It took Andromache a moment to realize the answer was literal. She opened her hand.

Three white flowers.


	3. Molossus

**Molossus**

* * *

It took over nearly two months for the large party make their way through the mountainous terrain between Thrace and Epirus on foot. They could have reached their destination sooner, but the old man died along the way and they had to honor him with proper funeral rites. Apparently he was a very important man—Andromache heard the others say he was once the king of the Dolopians.

Each time they set up camp for the night, Neoptolemus would call for Andromache. She willed her mind away in those moments, but she was always compliant. Her survival depended on it. Her revulsion towards him only seemed to entertain him.

When they reached Epirus, Neoptolemus freed Helenus as promised. Neoptolemus then used the wealth he seized from Troy to hire builders. They began building a palace on top of the mountains. Eight months passed before part of the palace was ready for dwelling, though rest of it would not be completed for four more years.

The palace became Andromache's home for the next eleven years.

A three-year-old boy giggled from behind a shrub bush.

Andromache was laying freshly-washed tunics on the rocks by the stream so that they would dry in the sun. Her thick, long dark braid fell over one shoulder, swinging gently as she worked. She was dressed in a tattered dark blue robe that had been worn to rags.

The boy giggled again, this time from a little further away. He was playing hide-and-seek.

Finally Andromache looked up for him. "Molossus, come here!"

The boy came running. He was a beautiful boy—a thick mass of dark curls covered his head. He had her eyes—beautiful large almond-shaped eyes, under thick dark lashes. His skin was as smooth as ivory. Nothing in his appearance resembled his father, at least not yet, and for that Andromache was glad.

"Sit," she instructed.

Molossus sat down on the rock next to her. He swung his little sandaled feet, humming to himself and fanning the hem of his peach-colored tunic. Andromache brushed her fingers through his hair fondly.

Seven years had passed since the fall of Troy.

* * *

When she and Molossus headed back to the palace, they saw Neoptolemus walking alongside an elderly man in the grand megaron, which was held up by six pillars.

All men in Hellas were immensely proud of their beards, and twenty-four year old Neoptolemus now had one of his own. He had his slaves trim it every two days—he was very particular about appearing kempt.

Molossus ran forward, his little feet pattering against the stones. "Father!"

Neoptolemus scooped the boy up with a laugh.

"Grandfather, this is my son Molossus," he said proudly to the old man.

The old man broke into a smile and touched Molossus on the forehead tenderly. "I heard rumors that you had a son." He then glanced at Andromache curiously. "And she is the mother, Pyrrhus?"

Andromache lowered her head.

"She is," Neoptolemus confirmed.

"One of your slave girls?"

"My war prize from Troy."

The old man turned back to Andromache. "You must be the wife of Hector." There was a tenderness in how he said it.

The notoriety of her fate pained her inside, but she did not let it show in her face.

"Andromache," Neoptolemus said, "bring my grandfather some wine."

"Yes master." Andromache was glad to leave. She went to the kitchens and found a bronze amphora filled with Cretan wine and returned to the hall. Neoptolemus and his grandfather sat together at a table. Molossus sat on the old man's lap and stared at his long white beard.

"Epirus is colder than Phthia," the old man remarked as Andromache poured his wine.

Andromache guessed the old man must be King Peleus, the father of Achilles. She knew he had fought alongside heroes like Heracles and Jason in his youth, though it was hard to imagine him ever having that much strength and vigor now. She was surprised he had traveled all the way from Phthia to Epirus in his old age—he must have been over ninety.

"The mountains isolate us," said Neoptolemus. "We receive very few visitors and know little of what goes on in the south."

He moved his own chalice forward for Andromache to fill.

"Then you haven't heard of the horrific turn of events in Mycenae?" King Peleus asked.

"The death of Agamemnon? I heard of it years ago."

"His son is now a mother-killer."

Neoptolemus looked intrigued and the old man explained how Orestes, son of Agamemnon, slew his mother and her lover to avenge his father's death. Neoptolemus did not seem to believe it.

"He slew his own mother," Neoptolemus repeated.

"There were rumors he was following the orders of Apollo."

Neoptolemus scowled at the very mention of Apollo's name. He held a grudge against the god, for Apollo had a hand in his father's death.

* * *

King Peleus had come from Phthia with fifty of his Myrmidons, and all would be sheltered within the palace. Neoptolemus hired three drummers, one flute player, one lyre player, and fourteen attractive dancers from the nearby villages. Of the dancers, seven were boys and seven were girls, and each danced naked while glistening of olive oil.

The men sacrificed a goat at the shrine of Thetis. As the guests ate, Andromache and the other slaves brought them wine and took care of the dirty dishes. Several of the Myrmidons had fought at Troy and recognized Andromache when she passed their tables. She heard them whisper and point. She kept her head up high and refused to let it get to her.

Molossus ran around the tables, and Andromache tried her best to get him to behave. However, Neoptolemus only laughed and pointed.

"That's my son," he said proudly to all the guests. "See how much life he has?"

* * *

The celebrations late into the night, and Molossus eventually tired of running around and fell asleep on a bench. Once Andromache had finished clearing all the tables, she carried the small child to his room and then retired to the bedroom she shared with Neoptolemus. He was not there, so she climbed into bed alone. She always slept on the left side.

Much time passed before Neoptolemus came to join her. He set his oil lamp on the cabinet and began undressing.

"What do you think of my grandfather?" he asked.

Neoptolemus had grown fond of Andromache over the years, whereas she had only become resigned to him.

"He seems kind," Andromache said.

"He does. This is the first time I've met him myself. I've asked him to stay with us."

Andromache turned to her left, and soon he crawled under the sheets himself. He was naked, she was clothed. She felt his hand slip underneath the fold of her robes and stroke her breast.

"I've been thinking I should marry soon," he said, as his fingers lazily circled her nipple. "To the daughter of Menelaus."

Neoptolemus had never mentioned marrying before. It made sense he would want a lawful wife, now that he was both a grown man and a king.

Andromache felt a little curious. "His daughter with Helen?"

Neoptolemus buried his face in the back of her neck. "Menelaus promised her to me some years ago. I told him I would wed her once I felt comfortably settled in Epirus."

Andromache tried to picture the girl. If Hermione of Sparta looked anything like her mother, she had a beauty that could bring a man to his knees. Andromache pictured a beautiful but lonely little girl who had only servants to keep her company—Helen and Menelaus had all but abandoned their child during the ten years they were at Troy.

* * *

King Peleus was not pleased when he heard his grandson's plan to marry the Spartan princess.

"The girl will make a terrible wife," the old man said. "You need to look no further than her mother to know that."

He and Neoptolemus were sitting together on a couch in the megaron. Molossus sat on the floor, dragging a little wooden toy chariot around and making gurgling sounds in his mouth. Andromache brought the two men their bread and wine.

"Perhaps the girl is not like her mother?" Neoptolemus asked.

King Peleus gave a laugh. "Like her father then, the greatest cuckold in all of Hellas?"

"I mean her upbringing," said Neoptolemus. "Many highborn children take after their nurses and tutors."

King Peleus dipped his bread in wine and said, "She's Spartan. Spartan women make better Amazons than they do wives. Now this one here…"

He gestured at Andromache, and Andromache lowered her head as if it would make her less noticeable.

"The daughter of Eetion would make a much better wife," said the old man, "and she's already given you a son."

Andromache had no desire to marry Neoptolemus. Though they were practically already married and a lawful union would simply elevate her status, she still found solace in the fact Hector was still lawfully her husband. She wanted to hold onto his memory.

To her relief, Neoptolemus scowled and said, "I'm not marrying my slave."

"Your great-uncle Telamon married his war prize. She was also from Troy."

Andromache realized King Peleus was speaking of the princess Hesione. She thought of the flowering ash in the royal courtyard of Troy, and the white flowers scattered around Cassandra's feet. She knew Cassandra was dead, killed by a Spartan woman.

"I will not insult Telamon because he is my kin," said Neoptolemus, "but I do not think his decision was wise."

Andromache wondered if she should speak. After all, the conversation involved her. Normally she would have stayed silent, but she sensed Neoptolemus was less savage in the presence of his grandfather.

"I do not seek to rise above my station," she said quietly.

King Peleus seemed amused by her words. Neoptolemus, however, did not.

"No one asked you," he said in annoyance.

* * *

A few days later, Neoptolemus decided to construct a shrine beside the palace. The shrine would be in honor of his paternal grandmother, the goddess Thetis. He took King Peleus with him so that they could see the progress their builders made to the foundation sight.

Meanwhile, Andromache took Molossus to the nearby stream to give him a bath. When she stripped him and he realized what it meant, he squealed and tried to get away from her.

"It's cold," he protested.

"It will feel warm soon enough," she said.

"It's _cold_!" he insisted.

She remembered the days in Troy when she could soak in a hot, steaming bath for hours. That kind of life now seemed unnecessarily extravagant.

Andromache reached her hand into the water. It was a little cooler than the outside air, but far from unbearable.

She stretched her other arm out towards her son. "Come. I'll bathe with you."

"No."

"Molossus…"

But Molossus took off running back towards the palace, completely nude. He streaked past a dark-haired man heading their way, who turned around curiously. There was something familiar about the man, and Andromache stared at him for a moment to see who it was.

"Helenus?" she asked tentatively. She had not seen her brother-in-law since Neoptolemus had freed him.

Helenus had grown his hair long as the men of Hellas did. The lower half of his face was now covered in a dark beard. But what made him barely recognizable were his well-kept clothes and the golden circlet on his head. He was not at all like the tattered slave who had separated from the rest of the party.

"Andromache," he said, recognizing her.

There was no smile of familiarity—he looked saddened by her rags and her unkempt hair. Andromache suddenly felt self-conscious, wondering if the years of slavery had turned her grotesque.

Helenus masked whatever he was thinking and remained formal, as if they were being watched. "My men and I have come to see Neoptolemus."

His words confused her. "Your men?"

She looked below them and saw six men carrying three large chests. Andromache wondered how Helenus's life had changed so drastically, but it wasn't her place to ask—she was only a slave.

"Then follow me," she said.

She led Helenus up the steps to the castle, and saw the maid Strophe sweeping the front steps. She asked Strophe to find Neoptolemus for her, and ushered Helenus to sit in the great hall. He sat numbly, and she picked up the amphora of wine.

When Helenus saw what she was doing, he quickly grabbed her wrist to stop her. "For heaven's sake, Andromache, don't _serve_ me. You are my brother's wife."

Andromache smiled at him, though she felt a pain of sadness. "You are my master's guest, Helenus."

"He won't be your master for long," Helenus said, "I'm getting you out of here."

He gestured towards the six men and their chests, and Andromache realized with a start that he was planning to buy her from Neoptolemus.

She swallowed. She felt tears come to her eyes, and was certain she wasn't worth such a trade. "No, Helenus. That boy who ran past you earlier, he is my son."

Helenus looked at her in disbelief. "With… _him_?"

Andromache looked down, humiliated.

Helenus moved his fist to his lips in thought. Before he could say anything, they heard footsteps from one side of the hall and saw Neoptolemus and King Peleus arrive.

"Helenus!" Neoptolemus called out in a friendly tone.

Helenus rose and gave a courteous bow, "King Neoptolemus." He no longer addressed the man as master.

"I hear you've become king of Bruthrotum."

"Yes—they made me their king when my prophecies ended their year-long drought."

Neoptolemus turned and saw Andromache listening.

"Well don't just stand there," he said, sounding irritated. "Pour us some wine."

Andromache forgot about the wine. "Yes master." She poured three cups of wine for Helenus, Neoptolemus, and the old man. Helenus stared at the amphora as she poured.

"How is my mother, Helenus?" Neoptolemus asked. "Is she well?"

"She is well, but she says she misses Scyros."

Neoptolemus had offered his mother to Helenus in marriage years ago. It was part of the deal in giving Helenus his freedom—a marriage to a Hellenic princess elevated Helenus's status.

After they chatted for a while, Helenus revealed why he had come. "I would like to take Andromache off your hands."

Andromache felt hope lift from her heart. Would she truly be free?

Helenus continued, "She is my brother's wife and I would disgrace his memory if I do not do what I can to free her from slavery. I hear she has a child—I will take the child too. To show my gratitude…"

Helenus indicated for his men to open the three chests. Andromache gasped when she saw each was filled with gold and bronze—tripods and chalices and daggers. It was enough to buy three ships. Surely she wasn't worth so much as that.

Neoptolemus's eyes flickered to the gifts. "No."

Andromache felt her heart pain her. Helenus fell silent.

Neoptolemus turned back to Helenus. "If you free my slave, where will she go? Her father and brothers are dead."

"She will live with me," Helenus said.

Neoptolemus laughed out loud. "Live with you? The woman is of no blood relation to you, Helenus. Imagine how my mother would feel if she saw you bring a second woman into her home. Why, it will be as if you are bringing home a second wife!"

The events played out as Andromache expected them to. A crushing feeling took hold of her heart all the same.

Helenus dared not argue any further, for Neoptolemus was high king—that meant he had jurisdiction over all other kings in the Epirus region, including Odysseus of Ithaca and Helenus himself.

* * *

After Helenus had left with his men, King Peleus spoke. "You still plan to marry the daughter of Menelaus?"

"I do," said Neoptolemus.

The old man sighed and rose slowly from his seat. "How will she react then, when she arrives and sees you're the one with a second wife?"

 **A/N: In case anyone is curious, this fanfic is based on Euripides' play of the same name and Apollodorus's Bibliotheca.**


	4. Hermione

Hermione

* * *

Three weeks passed before Neoptolemus sent a messenger to Sparta to formally announce he was ready to wed. The messenger returned after two weeks, with news that King Menelaus would send his daughter in a year's time.

"A year!" Neoptolemus repeated in disbelief when he heard the news. "Even if the girl walked on foot like a slave she could be here in a matter of weeks!"

"He wants to spend some more time with her," said the messenger. "She is his only daughter."

Neoptolemus scowled. "He dotes on his daughter as if she were a son."

* * *

One morning, all the female slaves went to the stream to do laundry. Once they had washed the soiled fabrics they unloaded from the carts, they took off their robes and washed them too. Molossus was not there—King Peleus wanted to spend some time with the boy.

The slave women were silent in the palace, but out by the stream they could finally be themselves. They joked about things they would never dare say in the palace.

"King Agamemnon of Mycenae was said to fear his Spartan wife," said Strophe. "Do you think our master will live in fear of Hermione?"

"He doesn't have enough emotion in him to fear," said Antistrophe.

"Well I hope she beats him," said Strophe.

"He is so deranged he will probably enjoy it," said Antistrophe.

"Maybe he will scream loudly from his bedroom," said Strophe. She made mimicking screams, " _Aiai_! _Aiai_!"

Epode cleared her throat. "Have some sensitivity. You don't seem to realize the mother of his child is with us."

The younger women looked at Andromache and grew silent. Andromache didn't want their pity.

"I am glad he is getting married," she said. "He will focus his attention elsewhere."

"If the Spartan princess bears the monster a son, Molossus will never amount to more than a slave," Epode warned. "What's more, he may even have to fear for his life. King Peleus killed his own bastard brother, what is to stop the son of Hermione from doing the same?"

Andromache grew quiet. She knew it was a possibility, but had tried to remain optimistic. After a moment, she regained her composure and simply said, "Whatever plans The Fates have in store for him are out of my hands."

The words pained her heart even as they left her mouth.

* * *

A week later, Andromache was sweeping the stone steps at the front of the palace. Molossus sat close to her, building a little tower of pebbles.

Andromache gazed out at the road that led to the palace. She knew Hermione would be arriving in a matter of weeks.

Suddenly, she sensed she wasn't alone. She turned around in a start and saw King Peleus standing behind her.

"Thoughts on your mind?" he asked pleasantly.

She quickly lowered her head. "Sorry, Master." She began sweeping again.

King Peleus sat on a stone bench slowly. "The cold weather is hard on old bones. I feel myself requiring my cane more often these days."

Andromache hesitated for a moment, wondering if he expected her to chat with him. She decided to keep sweeping.

"You've raised a lovely boy," Peleus remarked, watching Molossus stack his pebbles intently.

Andromache rested her broom for a moment. "He means the world to me."

"I heard you had another child. His name was Astyanax, I believe?"

The mention of her first son still pained her.

"We called him Scamandrius," Andromache clarified. "Astyanax was his nickname, given to him by the people of Troy."

"Are the rumors true? Did my grandson really kill him?"

Andromache was careful not to insult Neoptolemus to his grandfather's face. "He said he only did as the Odysseus ordered."

"Of course. He was a boy then. Our bodies mature faster than our minds, and Pyrrhus was a child in a grown man's body—all the strength of a warrior, with none of the reasoning."

Andromache did not believe Neoptolemus had reformed since then, but she pretended to agree.

Peleus put his hands on his knees. "It seems the gods too hold Odysseus accountable. They say he still hasn't arrived in Ithaca."

* * *

Early morning, a Spartan messenger arrived at the palace on horseback. He said he was part of Princess Hermione's wedding procession, and had traveled ahead so that preparations could be made for her arrival.

Neoptolemus ordered both guards and slaves alike to greet their new mistress at the front of the palace. When someone shouted that they sighted her carriage and seven horse-drawn wagons approaching, the slaves and guards hurried out and assumed their positions. Andromache escorted King Peleus, who walked slowly. Molossus stood by Andromache's side.

The carriage stopped at the front of the palace. The driver halted the reins, climbed down from his seat, and opened the door.

A beautiful young woman stepped out of the carriage wearing a wispy peach-colored tunic. Her golden hair was piled elegantly at the back of her head, a few glossy curls falling loose to frame her face. Her face was round, her sharp nose distinctively Hellenic. The skin on her arms and legs were golden and lean with muscle.

Andromache turned to her fellow slaves. The others gaped at Hermione, in awe of her beauty.

Hermione of Sparta married late, even by Spartan standards, due to the circumstances of her betrothal. Andromache guessed the young woman was in her mid-to-late twenties.

Hermione was naked from the side—her ribs, waist, hip, and thigh clearly visible through the flaps of her tunic. The only thing that held the tunic in place was the belt around her waist, and even that was loose.

Neoptolemus moved forward to greet the Spartan princess. "It's a pleasure to finally meet you, Hermione. I am Pyrrhus, son of Achilles and king of Epirus. This is my grandfather, King Peleus of Phthia."

Hermione gave a laugh as she reached out and touched his beard. "You are as handsome as they said your father was!" Even her voice was lovely—there was a musical quality to it.

"And you your mother. I have prepared—"

"Are these the Myrmidons?" Hermione asked excitedly as she looked at the guards in awe.

No one ever dared interrupt Neoptolemus before, especially not a woman. Neoptolemus appeared to ignore it for the sake of the event.

Neoptolemus calmly answered, "Yes, the men are my Myrmidons and the women are my prizes from Troy."

Hermione looked to the four female slaves, and then to Molossus.

"What about the boy?" she asked.

"That is my bastard son Molossus." Neoptolemus made an indication towards Andromache, "and his mother."

Hermione's eyes flickered to Andromache. Andromache lowered her head.

"My father never told me you had a son," Hermione said. She returned her gaze to Molossus. Molossus stared back at her innocently. Then he giggled and hid behind Andromache in embarrassment."

After a moment, Hermione tore her eyes away from the boy and turned to Neoptolemus, "He doesn't look like you."

Neoptolemus began walking back into the palace, "Maybe he will when he's older."

"Maybe," Hermione agreed as she followed him.

Hermione brought four female attendants to Epirus—three were young women from wealthy Spartan families, the fourth a woman of about sixty—Hermione' nurse. There were also seven Spartan men—six were her guards, the seventh her carriage driver.

The formal wedding feast would not take place for two more nights, as Neoptolemus needed time to extend formal invitations out to all the highborn men of Epirus. Many of these men had been residing on the Epirot Island of Ithaca for years as suitors to Queen Penelope.

Hermione spent much of the day walking around the palace, deciding what needed redecorating. She was certain the palace looked too colorless, and gave her men some money so that they could go to the nearby villages and purchase some rugs. She said she wanted deep red ones, as red was a vibrant color.

Until the night of the wedding feast, Hermione would have her own quarters in a guest room of the palace. Meanwhile, Andromache had been moved out of Neoptolemus's sleeping quarters. She was to share a room with Strophe, Antistrophe, and Epode from now on.

That night, she slept on some blankets on the hard wooden floor. Strophe slept on her left, Antistrophe and Epode on her right. The sisters were giddy with gossip.

"Did you see how he walked off when she said Molossus didn't look like him?" Strophe whispered in delight.

"She talks too much," said Antistrophe. "I bet he will send her back to her father in the morning."

"He won't," said Epode. "If there's one thing our master cares about, it's his reputation. If anything, he will wait until they are married and beat it out of her."

Andromache stared up at the wooden beams above them. "I like her. She reminds me of Cassandra."

Her fellow slaves silenced for a moment.

"Before or after Cassandra went insane?" asked Strophe.

"After, clearly," grunted Epode.

"Before," answered Andromache. "Cassandra had a boldness to her that I never had. She could look a man in the eye and tell him off if he made her uncomfortable. I could never do that."

"Which is why she is dead and you survive," said Epode.

* * *

 _A/N: Thank you Mya for the review! To answer your question without giving anything away, I just like to overthink the original myths. For example, I ask myself why Neoptolemus is so crazy and I try to apply modern logic to it (sociopath, grew up without a father, lots of pressure to be like the father he never knew, etc.) and so my story is based on taking the classical mythology and overthinking the hell out of them. Thus the things the characters do and the way they behave is based on earlier myths. I would explain more but I don't want to give too much away._


	5. The Wedding Feast

**The Wedding Feast**

* * *

The next morning, Andromache went to Neoptolemus's room to tidy the bed. He was still lying in it, awake and nude, staring up at the ceiling. His eyes flickered towards her when he heard her approach.

Andromache lowered her head. "Forgive me master. You are usually up at this hour."

Neoptolemus studied her in silence for a moment. After a while he said, "Come here."

Andromache walked towards him. Neoptolemus's eyes went to her robes. She knew he expected her to undress, so she slipped out of them. She didn't even think about it—the years of living with him had made it habit. She dropped the old worn robes in a pile beside the bed.

Neoptolemus moved his hands behind his head and closed his eyes. "Just use your mouth this time."

She crawled onto the bed and put her hand to his member, rubbing it in her hands. He inhaled and tilted his head back a little. She bent forward and wrapped her mouth around his manhood, trying to ignore the foul salty taste at its tip. Though she had done it time and time again, she never grew accustomed to the taste.

Neoptolemus reached a hand to the back of her head, stroking at a brown curl that had come loose. "I've dispatched messengers all over Epirus to invite all men of high standing to the wedding feast. That includes the son of Priam."

Helenus. A part of her heart warmed at the thought of him.

"Stay away from him," Neoptoemus ordered. I don't like how he tried to buy you off of me last year. The other slaves can fill his cup if he asks for more wine."

Andromache pulled away, using her fingers so that she could speak. "Yes Master."

She bent forward again and enclosed her mouth around his member. He made a little exhale through his nose.

A woman's surprised "Oh!" came from the doorway.

Andromache jerked back and saw a stunned Hermione and her nurse standing at the front of the room. Andromache quickly climbed off Neoptolemus and backed into the wall, her head down.

Neoptolemus opened his eyes and looked at Hermione. He didn't move and only appeared slightly irritated by her presence.

After a moment of silence, Hermione remembered why she had come. Her words came slowly and cautiously, "King Peleus was wondering why you were not yet awake."

"You didn't think of sending one of your servants instead?" Neoptolemus asked, irritated.

Hermione opened and closed her mouth. She was clearly too surprised to register it all at once. "I thought…I thought you would be happy to see it was me instead. I will not disturb you again."

Hermione exited the room, her nurse following behind. Andromache closed her eyes at the humiliation.

* * *

For the rest of the day, Andromache did her best to avoid Hermione. News of what had happened filled the ears of the Spartan servants, and they looked at Andromache in revulsion. She tried to shut it out while she dusted the tabletops and swept the floors in preparation for the feast.

On the morning of the wedding feast, Hermione summoned her to her room. It was a very large guest room that smelled faintly of flowers—Hermione's servant girls had gathered them on the way to Epirus and filled the room with four or five vases of them.

Hermione was sitting in a seat, bare-breasted. Two servants stood on either side of her, anointing her skin with olive oil. Her eyes flickered towards the door when she saw Andromache come in. "Brush my hair for me."

Andromache took a spot behind Hermione began to perform her task. Hermione's beautiful golden hair held a slight curl to it, and bounced back gracefully with each stroke of the brush.

Hermione faced the mirror in front of her, though her eyes were on Andromache's reflection rather than her own. Her expression was one of intrigue. "My mother told me many stories about her time in Troy. She said your husband was one of the few Trojans who treated her well."

Andromache swallowed. She quietly replied, "Hector was kind to everyone."

"I do not blame you for that incident I saw the other day," said Hermione. "I'm aware you are a slave and only do as you are told. I will talk to my husband tonight and ask him to stop bedding others. Or if he should continue, to at least be more discrete about it."

Andromache did not think Neoptolemus would do as Hermione asked, but she knew it was not her place to say anything. "Yes Mistress."

The old nurse was mixing a white paste in a bowl in a corner. She looked up at Hermione's words.

"You are too naïve," she said to Hermione. "The foreign woman seeks to undermine you. You are, after all, the daughter of Helen."

"No," Andromache protested.

Hermione laughed and turned to Andromache, "You must forgive my nurse. Her only son died at Troy."

"Killed by Hector," the old woman spat.

Once Hermione's hair was brushed, Andromache stood back as the old woman began applying the white paste to Hermione's face.

Hermione closed her eyes as the old woman applied the paste near them. "The thing you were doing yesterday when I walked in on you. Does he like that?"

Andromache felt shy about answering that. "Sometimes."

"What else does he like?"

"He likes it when you get down on your hands and knees, with your head and chest to the floor."

"With your buttocks up in the air, I suppose?"

Andromache paused. "Yes."

The old woman gave a derisive grunt. "You take advice from a foreign whore?"

"Oh shush," said Hermione to her nurse. "And what else? What else does he like?"

"He likes it when you are above him, straddling him like a man straddles a horse." Andromache blinked several times, rapidly, try to make the image go away. "And you slide forward and backward, and all he does is put his hands on the top of your thighs and watches."

The old woman finished applying the white paste on Hermione's face. She inspected her reflection in the mirror, turning this way and that.

"I should very much like to please him," said Hermione.

"A whore's tips," the old woman uttered.

"There's a reason married men turn to whores," Hermione said to her nurse. "I would much rather keep him all to myself. That way I can have a child before the year is over."

The old woman let out an annoyed " _ai_!" as she finished applying a red paint to Hermione's lips.

When the transformation was complete, Hermione looked not quite human. Yet there was something strikingly beautiful and enchanting about the white pasted skin and blood red lips.

* * *

At least a hundred guests arrived from all over Epirus—most from the islands of Dulichium, Same, Zacynthos, and Ithaca. They had come to pay respects to their high king on his wedding day. The megaron contained four long tables, each could seat up to forty men.

Neoptolemus and Hermione sat at the long table at the back of the megaron. King Peleus sat on the other side of Neoptolemus, and Molossus next to King Peleus. Neoptolemus noticed that Telemachus, son of Odysseus, was not among the guests.

"Where is he?" he asked in an annoyed whisper to his grandfather.

It was Hermione who whispered back, "He was visiting my father when I left for Epirus. Perhaps he has not yet returned."

Andromache and the other slaves walked around, filling cups of wine. She spied Helenus at the third table, close to the corner. He glanced at her at the same time, and she quickly looked away. She remembered what Neoptolemus's orders and didn't want to incur his wrath. When she passed by his seat, he called her name and she ignored him and kept walking. A pang of guilt struck through her chest.

The feast featured musicians, dancers, and a singer who recited a lengthy ballad on the adventures of the Argonauts. Most of the men applauded when the song was over, although King Peleus grumbled that the song contained a few erroneous facts.

"It took us fourteen days to sail from Lemnos to the shores of Propontis, not three," King Peleus insisted. "And we traveled northeast, not southeast. The singer does not even know his geography!"

"It matters little," said Neoptolemus.

"'Matters little'?" King Peleus repeated indignantly. "Would you say that when they start singing about your own father? Suppose they say he sailed west for Thrinacia instead of east for Troy!"

* * *

That night, as Andromache tucked Molossus into bed, Strophe came to her and said Neoptolemus had asked for her.

When Andromache enter his quarters, she saw Neoptolemus lying nude under the blankets of his bed. A full-dressed Hermione sat on the edge, no longer wearing her ceremonial paint. Hermione had been crying—the light from the brazier illuminated the shining tearstains on her cheeks, and her nose was pink and swollen. Her golden hair was spilling from its elegant bun.

"Wife," Neoptolemus addressed Hermione in an almost gentle tone, "tell my slave what you said earlier."

Hermione didn't answer.

"Well?" Neoptolemus asked her again.

When she still didn't speak, Neoptolemus spoke for her. "She asked me to stop bedding my slaves. 'Or at least be discreet about it,' she says."

Neoptolemus spoke as if he were amused, although Andromache could tell he was angry.

He continued, "Not even married a day and she's already making demands of me!"

Hermione turned away from them both.

"What do you think?" Neoptolemus asked, turning to Andromache suddenly. "Do you think the daughter of Menelaus gives reasonable demands?"

Andromache knew he expected only one answer. "No master."

"A man is discrete only when he fears his wife. Tell me, Andromache, am I a wife-fearing man?"

A fresh tear fell from Hermione's chin.

"I don't suppose you are," Andromache murmured.

Neoptolemus climbed off the bed and walked behind Andromache. He began sliding her robes upward until they went above her belly. He slid one hand over her hip, down through the dark mass between her legs, and lightly stroked her there. He thrust two fingers inside her. She drew a sharp breath, her head tilting back instinctively.

He moved his fingers in and out.

"Look Wife," he said lazily. "Look what I'm doing."

Hermione looked and then quickly averted her sight again in disgust. Andromache thought she had lost all her dignity years ago, but it felt as if the last bit of it—a phantom of what once existed—evaporated just then.

She felt the blood rise to her face and pound at her ears. It was synchronized with his hand movements.

"Do I make a better lover than Hector?" Neoptolemus asked.

Again, she knew he only expected one answer. "Yes."

"Do you want my cock inside of you?"

Andromache glanced at Hermione.

"Do you?" Neoptolemus pressed.

"If it pleases you," Andromache said numbly.

Neoptolemus pulled his fingers out of her and pushed her to the floor. He positioned himself and pushed inside.

"How is this for discretion?" he called out towards his wife.

Hermione kept her face turned away. "My father will hear about this."

"Will he?" Neoptolemus challenged. "It seems your father forgot to send you a scribe!"

He thrusted until he spilled his seed, and then stepped away and wiped himself on a clean towel on one of the tables.

"Leave us," he ordered Andromache.

She stood up and hurried out. She was glad to go.

* * *

The next morning, Hermione summoned Andromache to her room. This time, Hermione was fully-dressed in a pale pink tunic with dark gold edges. Her golden hair fell streamed freely down her back.

"Brush it for me," she said emotionlessly as Andromache arrived.

It was a repeat of the events from the day before, although this time Andromache could sense the hostility in Hermione's manner.

After a moment of silence, Hermione finally spoke.

"My mother said that my husband threw your first son from the walls of Troy."

Andromache hesitated for a moment. She wondered where the conversation was going. "Yes mistress."

"She also said that after Achilles killed Hector, he let his men stab the dead body with their spears, one after another, and when that was over Achilles tied your husband's body to the end of a chariot and dragged it around the city."

Andromache swallowed at the memory. "Yes mistress."

Hermione watched her through the mirror. "Have you no shame then, to spread your legs for the man whose house destroyed your own?"

"I told you she was a whore," said Hermione's nurse.

The words burned, and yet Andromache felt she deserved them. She did not respond.

Hermione continued. "If I were you, I would have done the respectable thing and ended my life. You should be ashamed of yourself, bedding a married man while his wife is forced to watch."

"It was not my choice," Andromache protested.

"A lie," the nurse said to Hermione. "You've seen how fondly she looks at the son she shares with him. The child raises her status, as you threaten hers."

"No," protested Andromache.

Hermione put her fingers to her lips for a moment. Her eyes lowered in thought. After a moment she drew her hand away.

"Perhaps I have been too naïve," she admitted. "I will not make the same mistake again." She looked at Andromache. "Get out."

"It's not like that," Andromache protested.

"GET OUT!" Hermione screamed.

Andromache lowered her head and excused herself. She barely stepped over the threshold when the door slammed behind her. She could hear Hermione weeping inside.

* * *

 _A/N:Thank you again Mya for your review! Thank you too ShadowElite, yeah all the backstory on Neoptolemus comes from the myths themselves - I took stuff from the Odyssey (his marriage to Hermione is mentioned briefly there), the Aeneid (his deeds at Troy), and Apollodorus (his deeds after Troy)._


	6. The Son of Achilles

**The Son of Achilles**

* * *

Since her marriage, Hermione had grown sullen. Neoptolemus continued to remind her she meant nothing to him, and little by little it affected her. Hermione didn't dare lash out at her husband, and so Andromache bore all the burden.

Hermione did little, harmless things to irritate Andromache: she would purposely drop things on the floor and order Andromache to pick them up. She insulted Andromache frequently, calling her all sorts of names—the most common being a shameless whore. She made a grand show of overdressing: she decked herself gold necklaces, gold earrings, and gold armbands so that everyone could see she held the wealth of Sparta.

Hermione became convinced that Neoptolemus would treat her better if she had a son. She grew obsessed with the idea.

Two months after Neoptolemus and Hermione's wedding, Andromache was on her knees, scrubbing the stone floor of the megaron.

Molossus was helping as much as a five-year-old boy could: he walked along on his short legs, picking up little pieces of dried up grass and caked dirt. He dropped them in a little pile beside Andromache. Andromache had made a game of it.

"Did you find everything?" she asked him.

His eyebrows tilted in concentration. "I think so."

He scurried off again, looking for more.

A door opened and closed in the hallway ahead. Hermione and her nurse were talking.

"Have patience," the nurse was saying. "Many women to not become with child right away. There's no need to fret, Child, you are still young—there is plenty of time."

Both women stopped when they noticed Andromache was within earshot. Andromache avoided their gaze, keeping her eyes on the floor.

Hermione walked right up to her.

Andromache knew she couldn't avoid the Spartan princess any longer and lifted her gaze.

"You take delight in my unhappiness, don't you?" Hermione inquired.

Andromache swallowed. "No Mistress."

"And yet you benefit from it."

Molossus watched Hermione innocently. He was too young to process the situation, but old enough to sense the hostility.

"I only wish for your happiness, Mistress," Andromache said woodenly.

Hermione gave a tearful laugh. She stepped intently on the still-wet stone and then made a show of walking along the cleaned for so that Andromache would have to redo the cleaning.

* * *

One morning, a messenger arrived from the nearby island of Dulichium bearing shocking news: not only had King Odysseus returned to Ithaca after long thought dead, he had killed all 136 of his wife's suitors and their families were now demanding his own death in return.

Neoptolemus blew up at the news: the 136 suitors had come from Dulichium, Same, Zacynthos, and Ithaca—all islands of Epirus, and all the suitors of high-born status.

"The gods had spared him so that I will kill him myself!" Neoptolemus shouted.

The messenger was afraid. "He heard the suitors were plotting to kill his son."

Neoptolemus sent the messenger back. "Tell the son of Laertes that his high king demands his presence here."

A week later, Odysseus himself showed up at the palace. Andromache hardly recognized the man: he had aged significantly in the ten years since the fall of Troy. His black hair and beard had turned gray, his skin had a brown and dried leathery look, and deep lines ran along the sides of his mouth. Yet he looked very strong, stronger than he had been at Troy.

Odysseus was dressed like a king, a golden circlet on his head and a light purple tunic over his lean muscled body. He had come with only his attending servants. His eyes lingered on Molossus, who was standing by a sitting King Peleus.

Neoptolemus sat in a chair facing the standing Odysseus. He was the first to speak.

"I thought you were dead, Odysseus."

"Pallas Athena bestowed her favor on me."

"Poseidon clearly didn't."

Odysseus was silent for a moment. Then he said, "You look more like your father than ever before."

"You killed over a hundred of my high-born men, Odysseus. Their families demand your life in return."

"I was defending my home."

"You could have appealed to me—I would have sent my Myrmidons over to ensure a peaceful return. Instead, you chose to act on your impulses. There needn't have been any bloodshed."

Odysseus was silent.

Neoptolemus called for his Myrmidon guards. "Odysseus son of Laertes is hereby banished as punishment for the murders of the highborn men of Epirus."

Odysseus made a motion of protest as the guards surrounded him. "I've spent twenty years trying to get home!"

"I'm sparring your life," Neoptolemus said almost lazily.

"Sparring my life?" Odysseus repeated furiously. "If it weren't for me, you would not have acquired the spoils of Troy! You wouldn't have even gone to Troy!"

"And had I not gone to Troy, we would not have won the war. You would have died there."

The Myrmidons began dragging Odysseus away. Odysseus struggled against them, but he was unarmed.

"You will never be the man your father was!" he shouted. "You disgrace him!"

"Careful, Odysseus," warned Neoptolemus, "I may have sparred your life, but I can always change my mind."

Odysseus was fuming. "To think I spoke highly of you to your father's shade!"

Andromache could tell from the tightness in Neoptolemus's jawline that the words struck him deeply.

Neoptolemus held up a hand to stop the guards.

"What are you saying?" He asked Odysseus sharply.

"You are nothing like your father."

"Yes, I get that part. What of his shade?"

Odysseus gave a bitter laugh. "I traveled to the Underworld in my journeys. I met many of our fallen comrades there: Agamemnon, for one, the sullen Ajax, and of course your father. The shade of the noble Achilles asked of his son. I told him you had excellent judgement, but I can see my words were erroneous." He spat at the floor. "I should have told him you were a coward, better known for killing babies and girls than warriors!"

Neoptolemus exploded, "Out! Out! Get him out of here!"

The guards dragged Odysseus out of megaron, and all the while he shouted, "The blood of the innocent stains your hands, Neoptolemus!"

A visibly shaken Neoptolemus sat numbly in his seat for a moment, his face drained of color. After some time, he called for one of his best men.

"Dispatch messengers to Dulichium, Same, Zacynthos, and Ithaca. I want the noble families to repay the house of Laertes for the damage done to the property," he said as he rose from his seat.

"Where are you going?" asked King Peleus.

"I need to take a walk on my own," said Neoptolemus. "To clear the air."

He did not return to the palace for some hours. When he did come back, it had grown dark. Hermione asked him where he had been and he pelted her with insults. She went to her bedroom in tears, and he slumped into a seat in the megaron and told Strophe to bring him wine.

He drank cup after cup, clearly distracted and staring at a blank space on the wall.

Andromache left to finish her chores. When she tucked Molossus into bed that night, the boy fussed that he wasn't sleepy.

"If you close your eyes, you will fall asleep," she said.

"I don't want to," Molossus insisted.

The door to the bedroom opened, and Andromache saw a drunken Neoptolemus standing in the doorway. He was practically propping himself up on the doorframe.

"I wanted to see my son," he said, his speech slightly thick.

Molossus looked at his father silently. The boy looked a little confused.

Neoptolemus stared at him wordlessly. After a moment, he stumbled into the room and took a seat on the bed, leaning his head back against the wall. He closed his eyes and breathed in deeply.

Andromache spoke up. "Molossus, why don't you go outside and play for a while?"

The boy crawled out of bed.

"Okay," he said obediently, and then left the room.

Neoptolemus kept his eyes closed, just breathing in and out heavily for a moment. Then he fell over onto his side, sprawled along the bed.

"The son of Achilles," he said, mocking himself. He turned so that he was on his back. Again he repeated it, "The son of Achilles."

He opened his eyes, turning his head so that he stared at Andromache. She felt unnerved by the stare.

"You despise me," he said. His voice suddenly sounded pained.

"You are drunk," she said.

"I am," he said. "I am." He laughed, "The promising son of Achilles, drunk and unhappy with two wives that hate him. I should have listened to my grandfather."

Andromache avoided eye contact with him. "The alcohol muddles your senses Master."

"It numbs the pain."

"Why are you in pain? You are a king, with a beautiful wife, an obedient son, and a vast kingdom of your own."

He gave a drunken giggle. "Don't you see? They don't belong to me, they belong to my father."

None of that made any sense to Andromache. "Achilles never became king of Epirus."

"I acquired the wealth to settle in Epirus from the spoils of Troy, which came from my father. I became king because of the reputation of my father. My son, your son, would never have been mine if Hector hadn't died at the hands of my father. And my wife—do you think Menelaus would have given her to me, had I not been the son of Achilles?"

Andromache did not see why that made him unhappy. "So your father left you a greater inheritance than most. You are blessed."

He giggled to himself. "Yes. I am blessed. What an honor it is, to constantly be compared to my legendary father. It's funny, because I've never actually met him." He turned to her. "When Odysseus came to fetch me from Scyros, the Achaeans were getting desperate. Achilles was dead and all these grown men expected an untested sixteen-year-old boy to replace their fearless leader. Do you know what that's like? To have over ten thousand desperate men look to you as their savior, expecting you to turn the tide of the war so that they can finally go home? I wanted to prove I was fearless. That I truly deserved the title of New Warrior." His eyebrows knitted together. "I did things. Things that haunt me."

Andromache felt no pity for the young man. "You threw my son off the walls of Troy."

"Odysseus was the one who declared the boy had to die. He said Astyanax would grow up to avenge his father and his city. Of course, he said he didn't have the stomach to do it himself. They all looked to each other, and I…I wanted to prove I was every bit as strong of a man as my father."

Andromache watched him in curiosity. A thought suddenly occurred to her. "Is that the type of man you think Achilles was? One who killed ruthlessly?"

"Isn't he? They say after he killed Hector, he let his men take turns stabbing the body before tying it to the end of his chariot."

The gruesome memory made Andromache close her eyes. Still, she felt a desire to tell Neoptolemus something that none of the Achaeans knew. "He gave the body back."

A confused expression fell on Neoptolemus's face. "What body?"

"Hector's body. Your father returned the body to the Trojans."

Neoptolemus went silent.

Andromache explained. "I remember that night. King Priam went to the Achaean fortifications even though everyone was protesting he would be killed. He came back later that night with Hector's body in a wagon. He said he went to Achilles's hut and they talked. We held a funeral."

Neoptolemus had an incredulous look on his face as he heard the story. "My father had the king of Troy within his hut…yet did not kill him?"

"He hated Agamemnon."

"That part I knew," Neoptolemus said. But he fell silent. After a while, he spoke again. "Ten years. The years passed quickly, didn't they?"

The years had passed slowly for Andromache. She felt all ties had severed between the Princess Andromache of Troy and her current self. She wondered if Hector would even want her back if her shade joined him in the Underworld—even she felt she was too far gone.

Neoptolemus snored. Andromache wondered how much of the conversation he would remember in the morning.


	7. Buthrotum

**Buthrotum**

* * *

 _A/N: Sorry it's been taking so long for me to update this! I'm working on an original story at the same time._

 _Thank you for the review Mya, to answer your question about Stockholm Syndrome, I felt that most girls in Ancient Greece had Stockholm syndrome since they pretty much all married strangers whom they were forced to depend on._

When Andromache first arrived in Troy, one thing that amazed her was just how fond everyone was of Hector.

He was easily the favorite of both his parents, his younger siblings all aspired to be like him, and the people of Troy loved him so much they cheered loudly when he appeared at festival gatherings.

Hector often listened carefully when he was spoken to and addressed everyone respectfully. And even when he felt someone was in the wrong, he would never berate them in excess. He never held grudges.

He did, however, feel the burden of being commander of the Trojan army.

Once a week, the Achaeans and Trojans ceased their fighting to bury the dead. On such a day two years into the war, Andromache walked with him along the corridors of the palace. She noticed he was silent.

Andromache touched him gently on the shoulder.

"Are you alright?" she asked.

Hector turned to her. He smiled faintly, "Let's sit down."

"Does your leg still hurt you?" she asked. Hector had been struck in the thigh with a spear two weeks earlier.

"It's healing," he said.

They stepped into the courtyard and moved to the bench. Hector winced as he sat down. A sparrow fluttered on the branches of the flowering ash above them.

On the opposite end of the courtyard, Helenus was crawling along the floor. He looked very focused on his task.

"What's he doing?" Hector asked Andromache.

She giggled, shaking her head.

"What are you doing there, Helenus?" Hector called.

Helenus saw them and put a finger to his lips. Andromache and Hector walked over to see better.

A trail of pine nuts dotted the rampart in a straight line. The trail was very long, the pine nuts gathered together in little clumps of three. There were at least twenty of these clumps, each spread far apart from one another.

After a moment, a squirrel darted out of the bushes and headed for the pine nuts.

Hector's eyes moved along the trail. "Is this for your prophecies, Helenus?"

"It's just for fun," Helenus answered with an embarrassed grin.

"Cheeee!" They were interrupted by the scream of a bird.

An owl had flown into the courtyard, heading straight for the sparrow perched on the flowering ash.

Andromache gave an "oh!" of surprise and threw her hands to her mouth.

A great struggle occurred within the flowering ash, scattering feathers, blood, and flowers all over the bench and ground. The fight was finished quickly and soon the owl carried its dead prey away, leaving a disaster behind.

Both Hector and Helenus fell silent.

Andromache was certain it was an omen from the gods. "What does that mean?"

"The owl is favored by Pallas Athena," reminded Helenus. "And the sparrow by Aphrodite."

Athena favored the Achaeans, Aphrodite the Trojans. Andromache looked at the blood and feathers strewn in front of her.

"Oh," she said quietly.

* * *

Andromache was summoned to Hermione's room. Hermione handed her a brush. Andromache took it hesitantly.

Hermione glared at her angrily through the dresser mirror. "You must be pleased with yourself."

Andromache knew why she was angry: Neoptolemus never returned to his bedroom last night. Hermione had assumed the worst.

Andromache had grown to dislike Hermione. Clarifying the misunderstanding seemed pointless—Hermione would simply look for other things to get angrily about. She brushed Hermione's hair in silence.

Hermione's gaze burned at her through the mirror. The room was too quiet.

At last, Hermione turned and shoved Andromache hard. Andromache was caught off-guard by the sudden movement. She fell against a stool, smacking the side of her head against the seat. Pain burst through her face and she clutched her injury, doubled over.

At mid-day, Neoptolemus, Hermione, King Peleus, and Molossus took their meal together. King Peleus fell ill a few weeks earlier, and though the illness was over it left him too weak to walk on his own. Andromache let him lean on her as she guided him to his seat.

Neoptolemus noticed the bruise on Andromache's face.

"What happened to you?" he asked bluntly.

It was Hermione who answered. "She was being insolent."

Neoptolemus turned to her. "So you beat my slaves now?" he demanded.

"I would hardly call it a beating. All I did was push her. She fell."

Molossus's large eyes moved from one to the other in silence.

"She's _my_ slave, not yours," said Neoptolemus. "You don't have permission to touch my slaves."

The situation was bizarre to Andromache—Neoptolemus, of all people, was the last person she would expect to get protection from.

Hermione looked ready to cry. "You side with your whore over your lawful wife."

Neoptolemus ignored her. He turned to his grandfather. "I plan to journey to Delphi first thing tomorrow."

King Peleus looked at his grandson, perplexed. "Delphi? What business do you have there?"

"Apollo killed my father."

The room fell silent for a moment.

"Have you gone mad?" King Peleus demanded, looking at Neoptolemus incredulously. "To demand Loxias for satisfaction in your father's death?"

"It's my decision," Neoptolemus insisted.

"For a mortal to challenge the gods!" Peleus expressed in outrage. "Do you seek your own death, Child?"

"I want answers," Neoptolemus said simply.

He would not listen to any more of his grandfather's protests. Hermione stayed silent—Andromache could tell she was glad her husband was going far away.

* * *

A week after Neoptolemus's departure, Andromache was spoon-feeding King Peleus soup in his bed.

She heard someone's footsteps and turned towards the door. It was Hermione's nurse.

"The Mistress is in the megaron," said the nurse. "She wants to see you, and your son."

Andromache sensed something very bad was about to happen. She pretended she wasn't nervous and extended her hand towards Molossus. "Come, Child."

Molossus walked forward and obediently took her hand. Andromache followed Hermione's nurse.

Hermione was talking to Neoptolemus's chief messenger in the doorway of the megaron, along with several other Myrmidon soldiers. Hermione looked happier than Andromache had seen her in a long time. She spoke to the messenger gaily and there was a lightness in how she carried herself, as if a great burden had been lifted off of her.

The messenger was a man in his thirties who seemed preoccupied by his thoughts.

"Are you sure your husband will allow you to do this, Mistress?" the man asked mildly.

"I will tell him the idea is mine," she assured him cheerily. "Completely mine. You can tell him I ordered it, even." Hermione turned around and noticed Andromache and Molossus. "And here they are!"

Hermione's cheery attitude made Andromache uneasy. She bowed her head in submission, "Mistress."

Hermione gave a merry laugh, flicking her wrist, "You don't have to call me 'Mistress' much longer. Andromache, I woke up with a brilliant idea." Her blue eyes turned upwards as she thought aloud, "I feel I've been behaving rather foolishly. After all, you only do as you are instructed."

Andromache wondered what brought on the change of heart.

Hermione continued. "And I am the queen of Epirus. Why do I feel so threatened by a slave? You're not more beautiful than me. You're as tall as a man, and your complexion is dark. And you are much older than me, aren't you?"

"I am old and ugly," Andromache quickly agreed, "while you are young and beautiful."

Hermione seemed pleased to hear it. "Do you think my husband will forget about you when he returns from Delphi?"

"I will pray to the gods that he shall, Mistress."

"I will too. Because I'm plan to sell you."

The words lingered in the air for a moment before they sank in. A cold dread crept up Andromache's spine. Though Neoptolemus was capable of violence, he had a predictability about him that she understood and knew how to tiptoe around. On the other hand, a new master meant the unknown.

Andromache cast aside her dignity and dropped to knees, grasping Hermione's knees as a supplicant. "Mistress!"

Hermione pried Andromache's hands off her. "You've left me no choice," she said. "Even Hera didn't turn a blind eye to Zeus's lovers."

The Myrmidon guards came forward and surrounded Andromache and Molossus. Molossus began crying in fear as he and Andromache were shackled.

"Take them," said Hermione. "Sell them far away from here."

The Myrmidons led Andromache and Molossus to a plain wooden carriage waiting outside. Andromache knew there was no point in fighting, as there was nowhere else for her to go. King Peleus was too old to protect her.

After Andromache and Molossus sat in the carriage, the door shut and the carriage began to move.

"Where are they taking us?" Molossus asked.

"I don't know," Andromache admitted.

The carriage traveled down the mountains and onto the silvery shoreline, passing thousands of trees. The unsteady carriage bounced up and down the entire time. Soon Andromache felt her limbs ache from sitting in the same position for too long.

Andromache poked her head out of the carriage window and looked at the men on horseback traveling around her.

"Where are we going?" she asked them.

They couldn't hear her over the squeaking of the carriage and the clomping of the horses. She asked her question again, and one of the men said "to Buthrotum!"

She vaguely remembered hearing the village name before, but couldn't remember what she knew. She drew back into the carriage.

The sun was setting when the carriage finally stopped. Andromache looked out and gasped at what she saw.

It was a large golden palace that bore a striking resemblance to the one in Troy, only much smaller. It was like someone had designed it to be its replica.

Andromache swallowed. She realized why the village Buthrotum had sounded so familiar to her.

One of the Myrmidons went forward into the building. Molossus looked out, terrified.

Andromache reached out and put her hand on his bare upper arm.

"We're safe, Molossus," she said.

After some time, Helenus appeared from the front steps of the palace. His eyes made contact with Andromache. She felt a leap of hope in her chest.

She climbed out of the carriage with the help of one of the Myrmidons and turned around to help Molossus.

The Myrmidon was explaining what had happened. "My lord will not return from Delphi for some time. My mistress ordered me to sell her so we cannot return with her and so I thought this would be the best place…"

Helenus gave the man a pouch of tokens. "Half of it is for your troubles. The other half you can give to your mistress and say it's what you sold her for."

The Myrmidons thanked Helenus and they departed, leaving Andromache and Molossus behind.

Andromache hated how easy it was to be bought and sold on the whims of others. She lowered her eyes when Helenus looked at her.

"Are you alright?" he asked. "The bruise on your face…"

"It's fine," said Andromache. She touched it self-consciously. "It's almost completely healed. I'm fine. I haven't been beaten, I simply..." She trailed off, looking at the palace in front of her. "Helenus, do you live here?"

"I had it built," he said.

She walked with him. Within the palace was a grand hall, with a long row of rooms. In the Trojan palace, there would have been fifty rooms along a single corridor and each would have belonged to one of Helenus's brothers. One room for Hector, another for Paris, another for Deiphobus, and so on. The palace of Buthrotum was less than half the size. Andromache counted maybe twenty rooms. She even saw a small courtyard, complete with its own tiny flowering ash. It would be years before it grew to the size of the one in Troy.

She felt a stab of pain looking at the little replica of Troy, and yet it brought her comfort at the same time.

"My wife's maidservants each have their own rooms," Hector said. "Other rooms are for guests. I can prepare one for you, and for…for…" he indicated towards Molossus, looking unsure what to call him. "For the boy."

Andromache put a hand on her son's shoulder, "Molossus, this is your uncle."

 _Uncle_ was not the right word, but there was no word to describe a slave mother's dead husband's brother.

Helenus swallowed. He was clearly unsure of what to do about the boy, but knelt before the child to have a better look at him. "Hello Molossus."

Molossus turned to Andromache for guidance.

"Touch his beard," Andromache urged. It was a Hellenic custom, but Andromache wanted Molossus to embrace Hellenic culture. It would be for his own safety.

Molossus did as he was told. Then he looked back to Andromache again.

Andromache sighed. "Go play. But stay in my sight."

Molossus wandered away from them.

Andromache remembered what Neoptolemus had said a year and a half before. "You married Neoptolemus's mother," she said to Helenus.

"Yes." Helenus said it rather emotionlessly. When Andromache didn't speak, he added, "Neoptolemus gave her to me in marriage when I got my freedom. We are polite to each other, but she didn't want to marry me any more than I wanted to marry her. But she is kind and mild-mannered, nothing like her son."

"Then you must be happy," Andromache said.

Helenus smiled weakly. He looked out at the empty long hallway. "Can you guess why I built this?"

"Because you miss them."

"I do. I miss them all." A crease appeared between his eyebrows. "And the hole—it never goes away. It's this constant, dull pain that just never goes away. There are maybe five minutes in the morning where I forget where I am and I'm happy, and when I remember, the pain returns."

Andromache nodded. She felt it too.

"But what am I complaining about," Helenus realized out loud. "You've had it far worse than me."

Andromache looked out at Molossus, who was walking around and studying the architecture of the palace. "I have him. He keeps me going."

She smiled at Helenus, but she felt her eyes water even through the smile.

"If I hadn't known better, I would have thought he was Scamandrius," said Helenus.

"He is," Andromache said. "He's Scamandrius, come back to me."

She tried not to remember the horrors that day, ten years ago, when Neoptolemus had torn Scamandrius from her arms and thrown him off the Scaean Gates. The cracking sound the boy's body made when it hit the rocks below was something that could still drain all the blood from her face.

"I had a prophetic dream last night," said Helenus suddenly.

Andromache looked at him curiously.

"Ants," he continued. "Slowly roasting under a scorching sun."

Andromache pictured it in her mind. She understood how his prophecies worked. "The ants represent the Myrmidons."

"Yes."

"And the sun is Apollo."

"That's what I think."

Andromache considered the prophecy. She had mixed feelings about it. It wasn't Neoptolemus she felt sorry for, but King Peleus. King Peleus had always been kind to her.

"How long have we known each other, Andromache?" Helenus said gently.

Andromache tried to remember. It had been ten years since the war, and the war itself had been ten years.

"Twenty years," she said.

It was more than half her life. And his, too.

"Twenty years," he repeated.

* * *

Two weeks later, Neoptolemus returned to Epirus and sent his men to collect Andromache and Molossus from Buthrotum. When they returned, the first thing Molossus did was run to his father. Neoptolemus ran his hand through his son's hair and kissed the boy on the top of his head. He made eye contact Andromache as he did so, but he didn't say anything. Hermione was nowhere to be seen.

That night, when Andromache went to the room she shared with the other slaves, they told her what had happened while she was gone.

"I had never seen the son of Achilles get so angry," said Strophe. "He gave his wife a good thrashing. Even I thought he was going to kill her."

"Is she alright?" Andromache asked. She asked only out of vague interest—she felt little empathy for the Spartan princess.

"She didn't break any bones, if that's what you're asking," said Antistrophe. "But she's black and blue and hiding her face in shame. When she recovers, I'm sure she'll be angrier at you than ever before."

"But she wouldn't dare try to sell you again," said Epode. "That's the important part."

Andromache wondered whether or not that was a good thing.

A week later, Andromache went to the stream with Molossus. The boy was almost six, and he spun his arms around and around while Andromache pulled along a cart full of amphoras that needed to be washed.

"King Peleus is getting me a tutor," Molossus said.

King Peleus was fond of the boy and spent much time with him.

"A tutor?" Andromache asked. "What kind of tutor?"

"A lyre tutor. King Peleus said my grandfather Achilles was an excellent lyre player, and that maybe one day I will be good at it as he was."

"My father was a great lyre player too," Andromache said. "He once had a lyre made entirely of gold."

And Achilles took it when he sacked the city of Thebe.

"Do you like King Peleus?" Andromache asked her son.

Molossus nodded.

Andromache smiled. "Good."

Once they reached the stream, Andromache began unloading the amphoras. Molossus jumped from rock to rock. After a moment, he picked something up in his hands. "Mother?"

Andromache dipped one of the amphoras into the stream. "Yes Child?"

The boy came running over to her. "What's this?"

He held out his hand. Inside were three pine nuts. Andromache stared at them for a moment. There were no pine trees in Epirus.

"Where did you get that?" she asked her son.

"There." Molossus pointed to one of the rocks he had jumped from.

Andromache put down the amphora and walked over to the rock to inspect it more closely. There was nothing else there. She looked around, and after a moment saw another collection of three pine nuts several rocks away.

She turned to Molossus, "Help me find more."

The boy hurried ahead of her, his bright brown eyes round and excited by the hunt. He found another group of nuts, and then another and another. They led him and Andromache away from the stream and into the grove of trees.

They traveled deeper and deeper into the grove, until they could no longer see the palace when they looked back.

They must have found over forty sets of pine nuts. At last, when they could find no more, Andromache stood still and looked around. They were surrounded on all sides by trees.

Andromache picked Molossus up in her arms instinctively. "Helenus?"

She heard a rustling sound and turned in the direction. Helenus appeared, looking strikingly handsome in a gray traveling cloak over a long white tunic.

"Oh Helenus," she whispered.

She put Molossus down. Without even being conscious of what she was doing, she hurried forward to Helenus and threw her arms around him. Her lips met his and they held each other, and for a sinful moment they kissed underneath the twinkling sunlight beneath the trees.


	8. Witchcraft

**Witchcraft**

* * *

Andromache walked blissfully back to the palace, holding Molossus by the hand and smiling to herself. A warm, pleasant sensation spread through her abdomen, permeating even through the bones in her arms and legs.

She ignored the feeling in the back of her head that said it was wrong—that it was immoral for her to be happy, when she had been reduced to the whore of Neoptolemus for ten years. And yet she plead with that side of her brain, asking didn't she deserve to find a glimpse of happiness after all she had been through?

All thought washed from her mind suddenly, when she saw a figure looking at her from the rocks above. Hermione's nurse, short and stout, had stepped out with a blanket in hand. She gave Andromache a glare that jolt a chill through her spine.

Andromache stopped. The nurse turned, lifting up the edges of her skirts and walking briskly into the palace.

Molossus turned his eyes to Andromache. "What is it, Mother?"

"Nothing," Andromache quickly said.

A cold dread came over her then. It settled in her lungs, making it hard for her to breathe. What did the old woman see?

Andromache quickly turned to her son. She brushed his soft dark locks from his eyes. "Don't tell anyone what you saw," she said frantically. "We were alone, alright?"

"Alright," Molossus said obediently.

"No one must know your uncle Helenus was here." She felt her voice shake.

If the old woman reported what she saw, Andromache would simply deny it. Hermione would believe her nurse, of course, but she would be the only one.

She noticed Molossus was still clutching the pine nuts in his small fist. She opened his hand and shook the nuts onto the dried mud beneath his feet.

"No!" Molossus protested. He tried to pick them back up but Andromache swatted his hand away. "I wanted that!"

"They're poisonous," Andromache lied. "You can't eat them. Now come…"

She reached out for his hand and he jerked away and began crying.

"Really!" she exclaimed in frustration.

Molossus refused to walk with her, so she walked without him, knowing that he would follow. He did, crying all the way. She refused to show him any attention when he cried, and eventually he stopped and followed her silently.

* * *

When they reached the palace, Hermione and her nurse were nowhere to be found. Andromache knew something bad was going to happen, and she felt on edge the entire time she swept and dusted and made the beds.

After she finished wiping down a table in the guest bedroom, she turned around and came face-to-face with a glaring Hermione.

Hermione had a maddened look about her. Maybe it was in the way she smiled in spite of the healing green-and-purple bruise near her eye, or the unhealthy whiteness of her skin. Maybe it was the way she wore her hair down and unkempt in a manner unfit for a queen. Though she was still beautiful with her glossy golden curls and smooth skin, there was a hardness in her eyes that made her seem like she was wearing a mask.

Andromache took a step back instinctively. "Mistress."

Hermione continued to smile at her in that hateful way. "I was right about you."

Andromache didn't say anything.

"I knew you were plotting against me," Hermione continued. She gave a little laugh and gave a shake of her head, her golden curls tumbling around her shoulders. "And I made myself look petty and foolish all this time. I underestimated the craftiness of foreigners, as my father had."

Andromache glanced behind Hermione, where the old nurse stood proudly and silently.

"What are these, Andromache?" Hermione suddenly asked.

She raised her closed fist to Andromache's eye level and opened her hand, showing the tree nuts collected from the rocky steps outside the palace. She tilted her hand, letting the nuts fall to the floor and scattered under the tables and chairs.

Andromache realized with dread she should have discarded the nuts further away. She had assumed no one would go looking for them, and that even if someone did the birds and squirrels would have gotten to them first.

"Pine nuts," declared Hermione. She thought it over for a moment and turned to the old nurse. "Who here eats pine nuts?"

"No one," said the nurse, glaring triumphantly at Andromache.

"She must have stolen them from one of my husband's Myrmidons, hasn't she?" asked Hermione.

Andromache didn't expect to be labeled a thief. She shook her head rapidly. "No…"

"If she didn't steal them, she seduced him like the whore she is," said the nurse.

Andromache felt her face warm.

"And yet, why go through all the trouble to seduce a man for some seeds she doesn't even eat?" asked Hermione. "What else could a foreign whore like her use them for?"

Andromache knew what was on Hermione's mind.

"Witchcraft," said the old nurse.

The two Spartans seemed to have rehearsed the whole conversation before they even approached.

"Yes," Hermione agreed. "Witchcraft. Like the wicked Medea, another foreign witch who seduced the good men of Hellas. What spell have you cast on me, you Asiatic whore?"

A rage filled Andromache, cold and hot at the same time, scalding her ears. She was too angry to feel fear. She kept her eyes downcast and tried to walk past Hermione, only for the Spartan princess to shove her back into the room and land a stinging slap across your face.

Andromache's hand flew to her cheek.

Hermione was breathing heavily, her lips pressed together and her lower jaw jutting out in a manner that gave her an unattractive, masculine look. Her large eyes looked like they belonged on an insane person.

"I went too far," Hermione said, more to herself than to Andromache. "Selling you was the right thing to do, I'm certain of that, but I should have left the boy in my care and raised him as my own, or at least for a few years until I had my own sons and could find a way to get rid of him. But I was too impulsive, and that was where I made my mistake." And then another thought occurred to her. She glanced at the tree nuts all over the floor. "That's the spell, wasn't it? To ensure I would never have sons to rival yours. You plan to make your own bastard the heir of Epirus."

Andromache didn't even bother denying it.

"I told you the foreign whore seeks to undermine you," said the old nurse to Hermione.

"I should have listened," Hermione agreed. "I was foolish not to. But now I know better."

She turned walked away, the flaps of her tunic billowing behind her to reveal her naked white legs. The old nurse followed her.

When Andromache was sure the two women had gone, she sank to the floor and closed her eyes. Living with Hermione was getting more and more difficult, and she was certain she couldn't tolerate it for much longer.

* * *

Meanwhile, Helenus's prophecy began to come true.

The weather in Epirus had always been cool, but ever since Neoptolemus's return from Delphi the sun had scorched the grounds, destroying crops and killing livestock. Peasants could not pay their taxes, and noblemen from the Epirot Islands sent their messengers to Neoptolemus to ask for wheat to feed their starving populations.

"It's Phoebus's doing," King Peleus grunted, when one of the Myrmidon soldiers standing guard outside the palace collapsed in the heat. "You should have known better than to demand reparations from a god."

At first Neoptolemus refused to believe it was anything more than a coincidence. When four months passed and the crops continued to die, he decided he would have to make another visit to Delphi to make amends.

When Andromache heard of the trip, she was terrified of being left alone with Hermione. She spoke of her fears to Strophe, Antistrophe, and Epode, and the women assured her that Hermione wouldn't be foolish enough to harm her after what had happened last time, especially not now that King Peleus was recovering from his illness.

* * *

A week before Neoptolemus departed for Delphi again, Andromache saw another trail of pine nuts left out for her while she washed soiled sheets in the stream. At first, she ignored it, knowing what dangers lurked beyond. After a while, she snuck away, following the trail deeper and deeper into the forest. She gasped when a figure appeared out from behind a tree and was relieved when she recognized it was Helenus.

"Andromache," he whispered.

He put his hands on her shoulders and gently pushed her against a tree. He placed his warm mouth on hers, pressing his body against hers. She could feel his body heat underneath their tunics and for a moment it made her dizzy. A feeling stirred in her that she had long forgotten.

Suddenly, she remembered herself and pushed him gently away.

"No," she protested, catching her breath. "You shouldn't be here."

She looked around nervously, paranoid that Hermione's nurse stood somewhere, spying.

"No one can find us," Helenus assured.

He cupped a hand to her cheek and ran calloused hand down her neck, and for a brief moment she closed her eyes as he peeled down the front of her robes and brought his hot mouth onto her breast. She felt his tongue circle her nipple.

She gasped, her head falling back instinctively. She cleared her thoughts. "I have to go back."

Helenus moved his mouth away, to take a breath.

"Stay," he murmured, his breath hitting her skin.

Her mind was in two places at once. For a second, the thought of Hermione and the old nurse lingered in the back of her head, but a rebellious spark within her was tired of constantly looking over her shoulder. She placed her hands on Helenus's abdomen. He had been slim and lean when she had first met him, strong and muscular in the later years of the War, weak after his capture on Mount Ida, and now had grown a bit round and soft as king of Buthrotum. But he was still the same Helenus, and he was the only one who had journeyed as far as she had, and she felt a comfort around him that she had thought was lost forever.

He reached for one of the pins on her tunic and she unpinned the other, and her robes fell around her breasts, held up by only a cord. With a tug, the cord fell away, and the robes landed in a heap on the ground. For a moment she grew self-conscious, worried about the way she looked.

Helenus didn't seem to care. He moved her gently to the ground and crawled over her, using his knees to push her thighs apart. His mouth was over hers, his warm tongue slipped into her mouth as his fingers ran along the sensitive fold between her legs. She moaned into his mouth.

Their faces broke apart as he reached down to fumble with his own clothes.

"Do you believe I've never wanted anyone badly as I want you now?" he whispered.

She believed it.

He positioned himself and slid inside her and she gasped, grasping his back. He began thrusting and she gripped him tight, trying her best not to cry out from jolts of pleasure. She closed her eyes, opening them just a peek because she wanted to look at him, and his mouth was a tight line.

Afterwards, they lay together on their backs panting, staring up at the trees.

"You can't come back here again, Helenus," Andromache warned.

He turned to her, his brown eyes warm and gentle. "The gods themselves won't be able to keep me away from you."

"It's the daughter of Menelaus. She thinks I'm a witch."

Helenus laughed at the very idea.

"She thinks I've cursed her and made her barren."

"More like the son of Achilles rarely beds her, if she's such a superstitious fool."

The words made her think of her own situation and she felt ashamed. He sensed it too and went silent.

"You can't come back here, Helenus." Her heart hurt as she said those words. "The pine nuts…she saw them. She knew no one here eats pine nuts."

"Then next time I will use pebbles."

"No…"

"Leaves then. No one will suspect anything with leaves."

"The risk of being caught is too great." She said.

He went quiet, knowing it was true.

"I have to go," she said, knowing she had already been gone for too long. She dressed herself quickly, patting her robes down and coming a hand through her hair to make sure she had shaken off all the leaves and twigs.

He dressed too, and gave her a quick kiss goodbye.

"If you need anything, you know where to find me," he said.

She nodded, and then hurried away down the path towards the stream.

* * *

A week later, Neoptolemus departed for Delphi again, leaving Andromache alone with Hermione.


	9. The Temple of Thetis

**The Temple of Thetis**

* * *

When Neoptolemus left again for Delphi, Andromache could only wait around helplessly as Hermione planned her next scheme.

Andromache avoided Hermione by spending most of her days by King Peleus's bedside. The old man found it tiring to get up these days and had to be helped up just to use the chamber pot.

During the six days of Neoptolemus's absence, Andromache didn't see Hermione at all. On the seventh, Andromache was carrying a chamber pot outdoors when she saw Hermione and the nurse speaking in the doorway. Andromache hesitated, only for both Spartan women to stop speaking and look at her. Andromache ducked her head down and continued walking.

When she passed by Hermione, Andromache saw the familiar glare on her face. Only there was something different about the glare this time—it was like Hermione was waiting for something.

"Something's wrong," she told her fellow slaves that night.

Strophe, Antistrophe, and Epode insisted nothing was wrong and reminded her that Neoptolemus gave his soldiers orders not to follow Hermione's wishes unless they aligned with his own.

Still, Andromache feared for her life. She began plotting her escape. She couldn't go to Helenus, as that was one of the first places they would look for her and she did not want to drag him down with her.

She would take Molossus far away from Hellas, where no one would recognize them. She thought Troy's faraway allies, the Thracians and the Lycians and even the Ethiopians. Perhaps King Tithonos of Ethiopia would pity the widow of Hector. But Molossus…what would happen to Molossus when they learned he was fathered by the son of Achilles?

Hermione threatened to kill the boy once she had children of her own.

No, their allies would be of no use. She had to disappear. She considered stealing back the jewelry and fine linen clothes stored away in the palace. They belonged to herself, to Queen Hecuba, to Hector's dead sisters and brothers' wives…

After she made sure Hermione and the nurse were gone, she went to one of the storage rooms and began taking the golden earrings and necklaces and armbands that had been taken from Troy. The sight of the jewelry brought back memories that cut into her, but she ignored them and filled a little pouch which she tucked into her side. She took a set of robes too—pink and patterned with gold along the edges—and draped it over an arm. She found Molossus sleeping sweetly, draped across the bed of King Peleus.

She reached out and nudged Molossus awake.

"We have to go," she whispered in a low voice. "Put on your cloak, we have to go."

King Peleus stirred. His eyes opened, and they saw Andromache and her cloak and the fine robes draped over her arm.

"Where are you going, Girl?" he asked, his voice hoarse.

She knew he was too old and weak to stop her.

"I'm sorry," she said to him. "You have been kind to me."

She grabbed Molossus by the wrist and quickly hurried out of the room and down the hall, taking the back exit and throwing the cloak over her head. She walked purposefully past the Myrmidon guards, as if she had every right to be out there, and they were accustomed to her ins and outs over the years and didn't stop her.

When she and Molossus had gone out of sight of the Myrmidon guards, they slowly made their way down the rocks. It was dangerous even in daytime, and at night Andromache could barely see.

"Be careful," she said to Molossus.

"I can do it," Molossus insisted. He seemed to have less trouble moving from rock to rock than she did. He was accustomed to running along the terrain and his smallness helped his balance.

Andromache moved more slowly—she tested each rock before she put her full weight on it. The drop wasn't so steep that she would plummet to her death, but she would certainly hurt herself enough that she would be forced to abandon her journey. And what would happen then, if she were found carrying stolen jewelry and clothes?

She looked behind her and, in the distance, saw the faint light of torches in the distance. A large group of soldiers was journeying towards the palace in two lines. The group was far away, but Andromache counted at least twenty torches. She couldn't see the figures cloaked the darkness.

"Wait," she whispered to Molossus. "Don't move."

She stayed in her own position, her long thin fingers clinging tightly to one rock while the knee of her left foot dug into a second and her right foot balanced against a third. The chilly air of the night stiffened her grip.

The group continued closer to the palace. Andromache squinted into the distance. The light from the torches illuminated just enough so that Andromache could see the men carried shields—not small round ones like ones the Myrmidons carried, but long shields that could cover the length of a man's body.

 _Spartans._

For every torch, she could see there were sixty Spartans. Even of Neoptolemus's guards forced Spartans to overpower Neoptolemus's guards.

Andromache suddenly knew what Hermione had been waiting for. A runaway slave and a small boy were no match against Spartan warriors on horseback. Even if they made it to the bottom of the mountain this way, they would be captured and killed.

If they went back, they would also be captured and killed.

When Troy fell, Cassandra had fled to the Temple of Athena for protection, where she had been raped by the son of Oileus. The storms that broke the seas and drowned half the Achaean ships taught all of Hellas never to desecrate the temples of the gods.

"Climb back up, Molossus," Andromache ordered.

"Why?" Molossus asked.

"We need to get to safety. Those men down there, they're coming to kill us."

Molossus scrambled back up the mountain in panic, and Andromache followed. When they made their way back to the top of the mountain, Andromache saw Strophe dumping out a basin of dirty water.

Andromache pushed her son to Strophe. "Hide him," she pleaded. "The Spartans—an army of them is approaching. They want me dead. They want _me_ dead, not Molossus, if they have me they will forget about him. My husband's brother is king of Buthrotum, I'm sure he will take Molossus in…"

Andromache pulled one of her gold necklaces out of the pouch at her waist and pressed it into Strophe's hands. "To pay for the travel."

Molossus began to cry.

Strophe looked terrified. "I'm only a slave myself, Andromache. How would Mistress react when she learns I have run off with her son?"

Andromache dropped to her knees and clasped onto Strophe as a supplicant.

"Molossus all I have," she heard herself say, "he's all I have and the only thing keeping me alive for the past six years."

And the raw truth of the words cut into her own ears, and tears began running down her face. She didn't realize she still felt enough to cry. When she finally got Strophe to agree and hurry away with Molossus down the side of the mountain, Andromache went to the edge of the mountain and glanced down. The Spartans had neared. It was only a matter of time before they arrived.

Andromache breathed deeply, feeling her heart race within her chest. It would be a terrible fate to live so long just for it all to end now.

Shaking, she walked towards the Temple of Thetis, not feeling any sensation in her legs.

The Temple of Thetis had been adorned with gold. The pillars were gold, as were the steps. A marble statue of the beautiful Thetis stood at the end of the temple, unclothed and rising from the sea. One smooth white arm was tucked behind her head, as if tucking her hair in place over one shoulder. The other arm rested against her neck, as if bashful of her own nakedness.

The temple smelled sweetly of frankincense and wine.

Under the statue of Thetis was a curved marble bench, where offerings were made.

Andromache walked slowly into the temple, hearing her steps tap lightly against the marble foundation. It felt strange for a foreign princess to ask protection from the mother of Achilles.

She walked up to the front of the temple and laid out the beautiful robes and jewels. She slipped on the gold armbands and put on her earrings. She undid the pins on her rags and changed into the pink and gold robes.

If she were to die, she would die as a princess.

Though the extravagant clothing and jewels were a source of familiar to her, she now felt like a bit of an imposter wearing them. She was not the same person she was ten years earlier. Even just looking down at the back of her hands, they were thin and worn and had experienced much hardship, the bones and veins clearly visible in the back of her palm. They seemed like someone else's hands.

She heard the sound of the soldiers in the distance. They had arrived. She could hear them entering the palace, and the brazen confidence of one gruff-voiced man, and knew the Spartan soldiers were looking for Andromache through each room of the palace.

After some time, the horse-crested helm of a young Spartan warrior poked through the doorway of the temple.

"She's here, King Menelaus!" the Spartan shouted gleefully. "I've found her!"

King Menelaus. Of course the greatest cuckold in all of Hellas would entertain his daughter's foolish theories.

Andromache sat up in her seat, her hands resting in her lap and her back straight. Her heart was pounding so hard she could feel the blood in her ears.

A heavy-set man in his fifties entered the temple and took off his horse crest helm. His hair and beard were mostly gray, though some streaks of red still showed in his bead and at his temples. He looked amused when he saw where Andromache had taken refuge.

Andromache had first seen Menelaus twenty years earlier, when he and King Odysseus of Ithaca had entered the citadel of Troy as envoys to ask for the return of Helen. King Priam had turned them away, asking why he should permit the return of Helen when the Achaeans laughed at his request for the return of Hesione. King Priam would have killed both kings for their insolence had Lord Antenor not intervened.

The guards followed King Menelaus into the temple. Four guards stationed themselves on either side of him. Another twenty stood just outside the door.

"I have to say I'm quite impressed by your will to live," King Menelaus remarked calmly, surveying the beauty and serenity of the temple. "When they dragged you aboard the ships, I was certain I'd seen the last of you."

She remembered some of the last words Hector had ever said to her. In a calm voice she said, "We live no longer than we are fated to live, and we die no sooner than we are fated to die."

"I suppose your fate was to spread your legs for the son of your husband's killer?" Menelaus taunted.

An anger flashed through Andromache. "What crime have I committed, Menelaus? It seems to me that the only crime I've committed is that I've survived."

"That in itself is a crime. It's shameful. A proper woman would have killed herself instead of crawling in bed with her husband's killer's son. While you," He looked distastefully at her rich robes and golden jewels. "You are no more than a whore."

Andromache laughed in outrage. She no longer felt fear, just a sense of injustice that had piled higher and higher until it had consumed her altogether. She felt delirious and a boldness came over her, "The greatest cuckold in the world has called me a whore. Have you forgotten whom you've married, Menelaus?"

Menelaus fumed at the insult. "Helen was a mere pawn under the will of the gods…"

Andromache indicated to the statue of Thetis behind her. "I too, am a pawn under the will of the gods."

"You seek protection from your husband's killer's mother…"

"She is my son's kin."

"Ah yes, your son." Menelaus suddenly smiled. "He's a good-looking boy."

A cold dread ran up Andromache's body. She wondered if Menelaus was pretending he knew more than he did.

Menelaus turned behind him. "Bring the boy!"

A Spartan warrior stepped into the doorframe. He was holding Molossus who shrieked and kicked as tears poured down his face.

"No!" Andromache cried out, shifting forward in her seat.

Menelaus looking amused by the terror on Andromache's face. "My men found him and a female slave trying to escape down the mountain. It wasn't hard to guess who he was."

Molossus's eyes turned to Andromache. His beautiful large eyes were watery and his face was pink. He let out a desperate cry. "Mother!"

The words cut deep into Andromache's heart.

"Why are you doing this?" she asked. She felt the blood drain from her face.

"A parent will go to any lengths to protect their child's well-being. Surely you feel the same way, don't you?"

Andromache swallowed. "Please. Let him go."

"Come down then. I won't harm the boy if you leave the temple willingly."

"Mother!" Molossus cried again, twisting in a Spartan soldier's grasp. The Spartan soldier bared his sword and Molossus began screaming at the sight.

"No!" Andromache cried.

"It's you or the boy, Andromache," said Menelaus. "Who will it be?"

Andromache swallowed. "You will let my son go if I give myself up?"

"Of course. The boy is none of my concern."

Andromache didn't trust him, but she had no other choice. She climbed off the shrine, her head high and back straight, and she walked along the length of the temple. When she stepped over the threshold, she was immediately seized on all sides by Spartan warriors.

Menelaus looked satisfied by how easy it was. "Kill the boy first. Have the mother watch."

Andromache screamed. She couldn't believe it was happening again. It was ten years ago, and Troy had just fallen, and Neoptolemus had seized a screaming Scamandrius…

"Just a moment, Menelaus!" A voice called out from the distance. "What is the meaning of this?"

Andromache turned at the sound of the voice in disbelief. The Myrmidon guards were there, with King Peleus as their leader.

Andromache didn't understand. Peleus was so sick he could barely stand. But then she saw how colorless his face looked and she knew it had been a great effort for him to climb out of bed and walk along the length of the palace.

The look Menelaus gave Peleus was one of shock. "Peleus son of Aeacus? Heavens, I thought you'd be dead by now."

Peleus hid his frailty. "Would you rob me of my heirs, Menelaus?"

"The boy is a bastard who threatens your future trueborn heirs, Peleus."

"If anyone is a threat to my family it's your daughter, Menelaus," said Peleus. "What can come from the bloodshed of an innocent woman and boy?"

"My daughter…"

"Your daughter is a fool, and she is a fool because you entrusted her into the care of that bitter old woman for ten years while waging a disastrous war to win back an unfaithful wife."

Menelaus's nostrils flared at the insult. Calmly, however, he said, "The boy is yours, then, but the girl is a threat to my daughter's wife rights. She is your grandson's slave, which means she is my daughter's slave and my own."

"She's under my protection," said Peleus. "The boy needs his mother."

"The king of Phthia, coming between affairs regarding a man and his slave?"

"If the man is a fool he will need wiser men to look over those decisions. And if you so much as touch this girl, Menelaus, my Myrmidons will show you no mercy."

Menelaus glared at Peleus. Peleus stood tall, his hands balled into fists. Andromache could see the aged man's withered fingers quivered slightly.

Menelaus was the first to break eye contact. He turned to the Spartans and uttered a command, and together they left the temple and their footsteps faded into the distance.

Andromache looked to King Peleus. She dropped to her knees in front of him, clutching his legs. "You've saved my life, and my son's, old sire. Thank you."

She looked up at King Peleus and he was smiling weakly. He touched his hand tenderly to her cheek.

"Foolish child," he said, "who will lay a finger on you?"

And then his eyes rolled into the back of his head. He swayed and fell forward.

Andromache caught him as he fell, softening the blow as he hit the ground. "Sire!"

* * *

 **A/N:** Thank you for reading this far! I have 2 more chapters after this.

If anyone cares or wants to read the ~authentic stuff~ this fanfic is based on, the sources are:

Andromache - play by Euripides (main source, this chapter was pretty much that play rewritten)

Bibliotheca - Pseudo-Apollodorus (main source, chronicles Neoptolemus's adventures after the war)

Odyssey - Homer (minor source, mentions Hermione's getting married about 2 months before Odysseus comes back to Ithaca)

Aeneid - Virgil (minor source, short scene with Helenus and Andromache)

It can all be found over the internet for free with a quick google search if you're interested and Bibliotheca's a pretty short.


	10. Strangers in the Megaron

**Strangers in the Megaron**

* * *

For the next two days, King Peleus lay in bed with a fever. He didn't wake. Andromache sat loyally by his bedside and changed the wet cloths applied to his head.

Molossus was left to his own devices most of the time, but frequently he entered the bedroom and looked at the pale, withered old man.

"He's dying, isn't he?" Molossus asked.

Andromache saw no reason to lie, not when Molossus himself had a near experience with death just days before. "He might be."

Molossus approached the bed. Peleus's eyes were closed, his mouth open and his breathing ragged. The room smelled of sweat and death.

Molossus extended his small, round little hand and placed it over the withered one over the blankets.

King Peleus shifted in the bed. "Thetis," he said hoarsely, "have you come for me, Thetis?"

Andromache didn't want Molossus to see any more. She took him by the hand. "Let's go to the kitchen."

As they left the room together, they heard King Peleus hoarsely ask, "he was a remarkable boy, wasn't he?"

Since the departure of Menelaus, Hermione had shut herself up in her room once again, and when Andromache walked past she heard the Spartan princess cry. It was an ugly, hysterical kind of cry, the type that sounded like the baying of an animal.

"He's going to kill me," Hermione's voice came thick and distorted. "He's going to kill me."

"He will do no such thing," the nurse said.

A silence.

"Why did you tell me to do it!" Hermione shrieked. "You words are poison! Your words are always poison!"

Another anguished howl came, and footsteps came towards the door. Andromache quickly continued walking, holding Molossus's hand tightly. The door opened and Hermione's nurse stepped out, her cloak draped over her shoulders. She barely made a glance in Andromache's direction before scurrying away.

Andromache realized she had won. Though not much had changed on the surface, she knew she no longer had anything to fear. She continued towards the kitchens, but stopped when she saw the silhouettes of two men in the doorway of the megaron.

Both men were in their early to mid-twenties. White daylight spilled around them, illuminating them only as outlines. The man on the left had soft blonde curls, the man on the right was black-haired.

Andromache looked behind her. With Neoptolemus gone, Peleus feverish, and Hermione shut away in her room, Andromache was the only one the two men could approach.

And they did. The black-haired man looked a complete stranger to Andromache, but there was something about the blonde-haired man that seemed familiar.

It was the blonde-haired man who stepped forward.

"My name is Orestes," he said, "son of Agamemnon. I hear my kinswoman lives here. This is my good friend Pylades, son of Strophius."

The son of Agamemnon. Andromache realized why he seemed so familiar to her. His golden hair seemed to illuminate light, like that of Helen and Hermione. He shared the same thin, sharp nose as Agamemnon. His soft chin was like that of Menelaus.

Andromache let go of Molossus. He knew now that it meant to go and play, so he did just that.

Orestes's eyes moved downwards onto the rags Andromache wore. "Are you a servant?"

"A slave," Andromache replied.

Orestes lowered his head. "I would like to speak to the son of Achilles."

"He's traveled to Delphi," Andromache said. She saw they had traveled far.

She remembered a conversation that Peleus and Neoptolemus had, years before. "You killed your mother and her lover."

His dark-haired companion spoke. "He has been purged of his sins by the will of Phoebus Apollo."

Apollo. _Ants burning under a scorching sun._

Andromache turned away from the two men. "I can show you to your rooms."

Andromache was bound by custom to treat the guests well, even if that guest was the relative of her greatest enemies. She took a stack of goatskins from a storage room and walked along the corridor to show the men to their rooms. She walked tall, with her back straight.

Orestes walked quickly, so that he was at her side. The dark-haired companion stayed behind.

"You are from east of the Aegean," Orestes observed. "I can hear it in your accent. Are you Trojan?"

"I was originally from Cilician Thebe."

"There's something in your speech," Orestes said. "I've been as far east as Tauris, and I've learned that no matter where you go you can always spot the royalty. Royals carry themselves differently, it's in their breeding."

His companion spoke to Andromache. "The wife of Hector was from Cilician Thebe. Did you know her?"

Andromache did not answer. She put the goat skins down and arranged two beds on the floor. "You will sleep here tonight."

"May I see my kinswoman?" Orestes asked.

Andromache could tell he had been raised by women. He was talking to her as if she were another man. It was a sign of his youth—all the able-bodied men had been at war during his upbringing.

"I will tell her you have arrived," she answered.

And she did just that, knowing she no longer had anything to fear from Hermione. She opened the door and saw the tear-stained Hermione with her hair a mess and her face red and puffy. The old nurse was placing a meal on the table.

"The son of Agamemnon is here to see you," Andromache answered shortly.

She walked off while Hermione shrilly exclaimed, "Orestes? By Zeus!"

Hermione started towards the door in a hurry and the old nurse shouted at her. " _Ai ai_ , you look like a wild animal. Fix your hair, change your clothes. Do you plan to frighten him off?"

Hermione froze at the door, and then sat down in front of the mirror. Her nurse picked up a comb and started brushing through Hermione's hair.

Andromache went back to check on Peleus. Strophe was there.

"He is getting worse," Strophe said. "It won't be long now."

"Is that you, Thetis?" he muttered again, turning slightly towards her. She bent over and took his hand between hers, feeling his thin scaly skin and the prominent frail bones.

Andromache picked up the bowl of water beside the bed and carried it out for emptying. She passed the megaron on the way there.

Hermione had, meanwhile, come out beautifully in a white-and-blue patterned tunic. Her golden curls had been carefully pinned above the back of her head.

"Orestes!" she exclaimed, heading towards her cousin in the forcefully slow steps of a girl attempting to be dignified. The old nurse walked several steps behind her.

They embraced.

Orestes touched her cheek. "Your face…"

Hermione shook her head rapidly. Tears once again began to fall from her face. "It's horrible here. I'm no more than a prisoner."

Andromache suppressed a laugh.

"I've come to take you away," Orestes said to her.

Andromache heard no more as she exited the megaron and dumped the bowl outside. When she returned into the palace with a fresh bowl, Orestes and Hermione were sitting together at the chairs in the front of the megaron. As double-cousins, they looked similar enough to be mistaken for brother and sister.

"You will be safe with me," Orestes assured her.

Hermione was shaking her head. "He will kill me. He is far too possessive to let his wife run away with someone else."

"Then I'll kill him," said Orestes.

Andromache wondered if the two had so much as met before. But it didn't matter. Despite Hermione's childishness, she was beautiful, and with her came the wealth and power of Sparta.

"He's in Delphi," Hermione said. "To ask Apollo for his repentance."

"Then we must travel to Delphi."

"I must come with you," she pleaded.

Hermione didn't even whisper—so desperate was she to get away from Neoptolemus that she didn't care if anyone knew.

Orestes assured her that they would travel for Delphi in the morning, and Andromache slipped back into the room of the dying Peleus.

Peleus's ragged breathing eased slowly over the course of the night. When earliest glimpses of purple and orange pierced the sky, his breathing had no sound at all. Andromache had to check his pulse to make sure he was still alive.

The next morning Orestes, his companion, Hermione, and the servants she had brought from Sparta departed together.

Four days later, Peleus was dead. He had never regained consciousness.

Andromache did not weep—she had lost so many loved ones in Troy that his death was just one of many that sapped at her life. Her thoughts simply drifted to the next step in logic: would they light a pyre for him, as they did for Hector, or would they bury him in the earth as the Achaeans did?

She decided a funeral pyre would be too difficult to build due to the cold and windy temperatures. Instead, she spent the rest of the day digging his tomb. She felt responsible for Peleus's death, as if the old man had exchanged his life to spare herself and Molossus.

Andromache, Strophe, Antistrophe, and Epode carried the body out of the palace. They did not follow traditional mourning rituals: they sang no songs, they shed no tears, and they did not beat their breasts or tear at their hair. Andromache did slip a token under his tongue and lead a short song, which the others echoed as a sign of respect.

They buried him near the temple of Thetis, just outside the foundation.

Andromache spent two more nights in the palace of Epirus. On the third she told Strophe, Antistrophe, and Epode that Neoptolemus wasn't going to come back from Delphi and that they needed to pack up and leave for Buthrotum. She repeated Helenus's prophecy to them, but the other women had their doubts.

"How can you be certain his prophecy isn't wrong?" asked Strophe.

"His prophecies are never wrong," Andromache defended.

"I won't leave until I see the body of Neoptolemus myself," said Antistrophe.

Andromache could tell her fellow slaves were too fearful to try to leave. That was the sort of power Neoptolemus had over all of them.

"Alright," she said. "I will go by myself."

She rummaged through the storage room and laid all her robes and jewels from Troy in a single cart. Then she draped a cloak the cart so that it wouldn't draw too much attention. She packed a wineskin with water and some fruit. She drew a black cloak over her own head, took the hand of Molossus, and together they descended down the pathway leading to the front of the palace.

Molossus ran ahead of her, skipping and laughing and not knowing just how crucial of a moment this was.

For years, Andromache felt like her entire body was wrapped in tight, painful knots. And as she walked through along the trampled footpath heading westward, those tight knots seemed to loosen and slip off of her, one by one. Every few hundred paces opened her chest a little, making it easier to breath. The air felt cool and crisp against her skin.

A girlish giggle came from the one of the nearby trees. Andromache wasn't afraid, she smiled and turned towards the pure sound. Behind the tree was a girl, her hair streaming down naked shoulders. The girl looked about seventeen or so, but Andromache could see the girl gave off an immortal glow.

"Do you see her, Molossus?" she asked towards her son.

Molossus stopped zig zagging through the trees and stopped, looking in awe at the girl. The girl gave a giggle and vanished behind the tree. Molossus ran after her to chase her down, but he made a full circle around the tree and then looked confused when he saw the girl had disappeared.

Andromache couldn't help but laugh. She threw her head back and the uninhibited joy came out like a lighthearted bursting of bubbles.

"What's was she?" Molossus asked.

"She was a hamadryad."

"Where did she go?"

"She's in the tree."

Molossus circled around the tree two, three more times, and finding nothing.

"She was lovely, wasn't she?" Andromache asked the boy.

Molossus nodded, his wide dark eyes looking around excitedly with a shine. He ran forward, scrambling on his tiny legs, his mouth open with a tiny pant. He was determined to find another hamadryad to play with.

And that was how they traveled, all the way to Buthrotum.

When they neared the palace, Helenus was outside, his head tilted up towards the sky as if counting the clouds or the birds. He noticed Andromache and Molossus and started walking towards them.

She felt herself walk faster, letting go of Molossus's hand. She felt her face smile on its own.

When they reached, her hands took ahold of his arms just beneath the elbow. He lightly covered her hands with his.

"Is he dead?" she asked breathlessly, searching his face hungrily for the answer.

He gave a nod, and a smile. "He is dead. He was killed this morning."

She threw her arms around him, her hold tight, clinging onto him for dear life as tears streamed down her eyes. She felt lightheaded. Her knees felt weak, and she would have sunk to the ground if Helenus had not kept her up. She felt exhausted—not from the walk to Buthrotum, but of her life itself, and of all those years of hiding her fear and misery.

She closed her eyes, breathing in his scent. "I'm so tired, Helenus."

He ran a hand over the top of her head and brought his lips to her forehead. "It's over now."

Behind her came the giggles of the hamadryads.

* * *

 _A/N: Thank you so much to Mya, Madame Thome, and Liquidation for your reviews!_


	11. Epilogue

**Epilogue**

* * *

When messengers arrived in Epirus saying Neoptolemus had been killed, Helenus formally divorced the Princess Deidamia. The Scyros princess and her entourage departed from the Buthrotum palace.

The years had hardened Andromache, teaching her to fend only for herself and Molossus. She felt nothing as the train faded into the distance.

"Do you know how he died?" she asked Helenus as the two of them walked back into the palace.

"By a mob," Helenus said. "They didn't recognize him, and believed him to be a thief attempting to steal from the oracle."

The idea that Neoptolemus would steal from the oracle at Delphi was ridiculous. He possessed all the wealth of Epirus.

"The son of Agamemnon must have spread the rumor," Andromache decided. "He could not defeat the son of Achilles in hand-to-hand combat, so he used deceit."

Helenus looked at Andromache curiously, and she avoided his eyes. She wasn't sure why she said that.

Andromache and Helenus were married in a ceremony, and with that marriage they became the king and queen of Epirus. Within a year, Andromache discovered she was with child. By then she was nearing forty and worried whether or not she would survive the birth.

When the time came, Antistrophe and Epode took turns walking her around a room as she breathed deeply in an effort to keep the pain distant. And when the contractions worsened she screamed, gripping a hold of the bed furs as the white hot pain coursed through her and sent her body into uncontrollable shivers even after the pain had passed.

She was in labor for a full day, and it wasn't until late the next night that she finally delivered a small, squalling baby boy with a wisp of black hair on his head.

* * *

Andromache woke after a while and saw Helenus standing beside the bed, holding the swaddled infant in his arms. When he saw Andromache had woken, his face spread into a bashful grin.

"He's beautiful," Helenus said.

"Do you have a name for him?" she asked. Her voice was weak and hoarse to her own ears.

Helenus looked down at the baby. "Cestrinus."

The name amused her. She managed a small smile.

"You name him after fish," she said, thinking of the dangerous, snakelike _cestra_ that fishermen often spoke of.

"You don't like it?" Helenus asked innocently.

She reached her arms out, and he handed her the baby. She cradled it in silence for a moment.

"I like it," she decided. "The cestra are strong, and they travel far."

"They are survivors," said Helenus.

Andromache touched the baby's soft cheek. "They are."

* * *

One night, Andromache stepped out of the palace.

She had gradually settled into her comfortable new life as queen of Epirus, but the horrors she had endured as a slave never quite left her. Sometimes she felt like she was in a dream, that the riches of Buthrotum were just an illusion that would disappear and leave her tied down to the mast of the ship sailing from Troy. Sometimes she woke up in the middle of the night and listened to Helenus breathe, just to be sure that it was all real and she was safe.

She was happy now, but if she had to do it all over again she would have preferred death.

Tears came to her eyes unprovoked. It didn't make sense to her. She rarely shed tears when she lived in terror under Neoptolemus, but now that she was safe she found herself crying often when she was alone.

As she blinked rapidly to make her tears go away, she noticed torches in the distance. The sight of them sent a shiver through her body as she remembered what happened the last time she saw such a sight.

She relaxed a little when she saw that many of the nearing mob didn't carry shields at all. And some of the people were women and children. All looked like they had been traveling a long distance, for they moved slowly.

The travelers noticed Andromache. She could sense there was no danger, so she approached them.

The older of the two men was about her own age, and he stared at her as if he were seeing a ghost.

"Could it be?" he asked, after a moment. "Andromache, is it really you?"

Andromache was surprised the man knew her name. She stared back at him. Under the torchlight she could see he had a straight thin nose and the build of a seasoned warrior. A few strands of gray glistened in his hair. There was something familiar about his face, and after a moment Andromache realized who he was.

"Aeneas?" she whispered.

The man smiled at her.

She hurried forward and embraced him, squeezing as tightly as she could. Aeneas pulled away.

"Do you recognize my son?" he asked, gesturing her towards the young man beside him.

"I didn't," Andromache breathed. "Is it really Ascanius? By the gods, you've grown so tall!"

The tall youth put a hand to the back of his head, looking embarrassed.

Andromache looked behind them, at the young warriors, and the mothers with babies at their breasts, and the middle-aged. There must have been eighty of them in total.

"They're the ones who escaped as the city fell," Aeneas said. "We've been traveling for a very, very long time."

Andromache hadn't known about the other survivors. She felt a warm, pleasant sensation permeate through her bones. "I didn't realize there were so many survivors."

"There were many more," said Aeneas. "But the journey has been a long one."

The three of them walked back to the castle together. Andromache and Aeneas walked side-by-side, with Ascanius trailing behind them.

"There were rumors you had been taken captive," said Aeneas, "by the son of Achilles."

Even though his words meant no harm, Andromache felt their blow.

She kept her eyes straight ahead as she said, "Those who were buried at Troy were the fortunate ones."

She sensed Aeneas turning to her, but he knew better than to press the matter further.

That night, the former Trojans all feasted together. Helenus and Aeneas spoke at great length about the war. Sometimes, Helenus threw his head back and laughed, his handsome dark eyes crinkling as Aeneas shared a funny story.

A few days later, Aeneas and his band departed from Buthrotum, heading west for Sicily. Andromache was sad to see them go.

"I wish they would have stayed with us," she said from the shoreline as they watched the ships sail away.

"The gods gave Aeneas a different fate," Helenus answered.

Andromache looked at him. Helenus's hair was turning gray, and there was a distant, glassier look in his eyes now, like he could see hundreds and even thousands of years ahead.

"The gods wanted us to rule over Epirus," Andromache realized, as she looked out at the shimmering water in the distance.

"A line of powerful kings will have your blood coursing through their veins," he said.

The idea was a little overwhelming. Andromache watched the waves crash against the rocks in the distance.

When Aeneas's ships disappeared beyond the horizon, Andromache and Helenus walked back towards the palace together.

Andromache spoke. "When we were tied up on the ship together, you said that it wasn't over. Even then you knew."

His eyes grew distant again. "I had a vision," he said quietly.

"Of you and me?" Andromache pressed.

"Of a line of faceless kings, standing together in a single line. They were the future kings of Epirus, each more powerful than the last. When I walked around them, I saw they all had your eyes."

The words sent a shiver through her. A worry gnawed at her. "Molossus…"

Her greatest worry was that Molossus would be shuffled aside, the way many sons from previous unions often were.

"Molossus will be king of Epirus after me," Helenus said.

Andromache wasn't sure if she believed him. She didn't doubt his integrity, but it didn't make sense for any man to favor another's bastard over his own.

Helenus could sense her hesitation and explained. "He is the rightful heir to Epirus, after his father. His connection to Achilles will rally men around him. He will be an excellent king—that I've seen in my visions."

A shiver went through her. It was more than she had ever dared to wish for. She threw her arms around him and buried her face in the curve of his neck.

* * *

After a while, they walked back into the palace and passed the open courtyard. Molossus was sitting under the young ash tree, plucked a slow song on a silver lyre. He was twelve now, and tall for his age, his dense eyebrows furrowed in concentration.

The young ash tree had blossomed for the first time that spring. One little flower fell from the tree, softly grazing Molossus's hair. The laughing shriek of a toddler rang musically from a distant room of the palace, as Epode scolded little Cestrinus as his tiny feet pattered along the marble floor.

Three sons. Three white blossoms from the flowering ash. Cassandra's prophecy had come true at last.

The End


End file.
